UC-NRLF 


SB    IS?    MMM 


LETTERS 

FROM  MY 
MIL  T  ^  ^ 


Hittlt 


Letters  from  My  Mill 

To  which  are  added 

Letters  to  an  Absent  One 

By 
Alphonse  Daudet 

Translated  by  Katharine  Prescott  Wormeley 
Illustrated  by   Paul  Avril 


Boston 

Little,  Brown,  and  Company 
1901 


REPLACING 


Copyright,  1900, 
BY  LITTLE,  BROWN,  AND  COMPANY. 

All  right*  reserved. 


JOHN  WILSON  AND  SON,  CAMBRIDGE,  U.S.A. 


CONTENTS. 


J 


LETTERS    FROM    MY    MILL. 

PAGE 

PREAMBLE ix 

TAKING  POSSESSION i 

-THE  BEAUCAIRE  DILIGENCE 5 

THE  SECRET  OF  MAITRE  CORNILLE 10 

M.  SEGUIN'S  GOAT      . 18 

THE  STARS 27 

•  THE  ARLESIAN  GIRL 35 

yTHE  POPE'S  MULE 41 

THE  LIGHTHOUSE 55 

THE  WRECK  OF  THE  "  S^MILLANTE  " 63 

CUSTOM-HOUSE  PEOPLE 72 

•  THE  CUR£  OF  CUCUGNAN 78 

AGED  FOLK 86 

PROSE  BALLADS: 

The  Death  of  the  Dauphin 96 

The  Sub-prefect  in  the  Fields 100 

BIXIOU'S  PORTFOLIO 105 

THE  LEGEND  OF  THE  MAN  WITH  THE  GOLDEN  BRAIN   .  112 

THE  POET  MISTRAL 118 

ORANGES 127 

THE  Two  INNS 132 

AT  MILIANAH 138 

THE  LOCUSTS 153 


533 


J 


vi  Contents. 

PAGH 

THE  ELIXIR  OF  THE  REVEREND  PERE  GAUCHER     ...  159 

IN  CAMARGUE .    .  172 

BARRACK  HOMESICKNESS 186 

LETTERS  TO  AN  ABSENT   ONE. 

THE  SURRENDER 193 

THE  DICTATORS 199 

A  MUSHROOM  BED  OF  GREAT  MEN 204 

ROCHEFORT  AND  ROSSIGNOL 211 

THE  SENTRY-BOX 218 

THE  TRICOTEUSE      . 225 

A  YEAR  OF  TROUBLE 233 


LIST   OF   ILLUSTRATIONS. 

Photogravured  by  Goupil  6*  Co.,  Paris. 

"  Again 't  was  the  terrible  bandit,  Count  Severan,  whom 

he  drove  to  his  eyrie  on  the  heights  "  .     .     Frontispiece 
Drawn  by  Paul  Avril. 

"  She  stayed  thus,  never  moving,  till  the  stars  in  the 

sky  grew  pale  " 34 

Drawn  by  Paul  Avril. 

Fre'de'ric  Mistral 118 

From  a  Photograph. 

"  Overcome  at  last,  he  let  himself  fall  into  a  big  arm- 
chair"   168 

Drawn  by  Paul  Avril. 


PREAMBLE. 

BEFORE  Mattre  Honorat  Grapazi,  notary  of  the 
district  of  Pamperigouste 

Appeared : 

The  Sieur  Gaspard  Mitifio,  husband  of  Vivette 
Cornille,  owner  of  the  property  called  "  Les 
Cigalieres"  and  there  residing: 

The  same  by  these  presents  has  sold  and  con- 
veyed under  warranty  of  right  and  possession,  free 
of  all  debt,  claims  and  mortgages, 

To  the  Sieur  Alphonse  Daudet,  poet,  residing 
in  Paris,  here  present  and  accepting, 

A  windmill  for  flour,  situated  in  the  valley  of  the 
Rhone,  and  in  the  heart  of  Provence,  on  a  hillside, 
wooded  with  pine  and  live-oak ;  the  said  mill  being 
abandoned  for  twenty  years  or  more,  and  therefore 
unfit  for  grinding,  as  appears  from  the  wild  vines, 
mosses,  rosemarys,  and  other  parasitical  growths 
which  have  climbed  its  sails ; 

Notwithstanding  which,  such  as  it  is  and  appears 
with  its  great  wheel  broken  and  its  platform  where 
the  grass  is  growing  between  the  bricks,  the  Sieur 
Daudet  declares  that  finding  the  said  mill  to  his 
liking  and  serviceable  to  his  works  of  poesy,  he 


x  Preamble. 

accepts  the  same  at  his  risks  and  perils,  and  with- 
out any  claim  whatsoever  against  the  vendor  for. 
repairs  which  may  have  to  be  made. 

This  sale  is  concluded  in  the  lump  for  the  sum 
agreed  upon,  which  the  Sieur  Daudet  placed  and 
deposited  on  the  desk  in  current  coin,  the  which 
sum  was  immediately  touched  and  withdrawn  by 
the  Sieur  Mitifio,  within  sight  of  the  undersigned 
notary  and  witnesses,  for  which  receipt  is  given. 

Deed  done  at  Pampe>igouste  in  the  office  of 
Honorat  Grapazi,  in  presence  of  Francet  Mama'f, 
fife-player,  and  Louiset,  called  le  Quique,  cross- 
bearer  of  the  White  Penitents  ; 

Who  have  signed  with  the  parties  and  the  no- 
tary after  reading  of  the  deed. 


LETTERS  FROM  MY  MILL. 


TAKING  POSSESSION. 

'  T  WAS  the  rabbits  who  were  astonished  !  So 
long  had  they  seen  the  mill-door  closed,  the  walls 
and  the  platform  invaded  by  verdure,  that  they  had 
come  to  think  the  race  of  millers  was  extinct ;  and 
finding  the  place  convenient,  they  made  it,  as  it 
were,  a  sort  of  headquarters,  a  centre  of  strategi- 
cal operations,  —  the  Jemmapes  mill  of  rabbits. 
The  night  of  my  arrival,  there  were  fully,  with- 
out exaggeration,  a  score  sitting  in  a  circle  on 
the  platform,  warming  their  paws  in  the  moon- 
shine. One  second  to  open  a  window,  and,  scat ! 
away  went  the  bivouac,  routed ;  all  the  little  white 
behinds  scurrying  away,  tails  up,  into  the  thicket. 
I  hope  they  will  come  back  again. 

Another  much  astonished  individual  was  the 
tenant  of  the  first  floor,  a  solemn  old  owl  with 
the  head  of  a  thinker,  who  has  lived  in  the  mill 
for  over  twenty  years.  I  found  him  in  the  upper 
chamber,  motionless  and  erect  on  the  horizontal 
shaft,  in  the  midst  of  the  plaster  rubbish  and  fallen 
roof-tiles.  He  looked  at  me  for  a  moment  with  his 


2  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

round  eye ;  then,  alarmed  at  not  knowing  me,  he 
began  to  say,  "  Hoo !  hoo ! "  and  to  shake  his 
wings  heavily,  gray  with  dust  —  those  devilish 
thinkers  !  they  never  brush  themselves.  .  .  Well ! 
never  mind,  whatever  he  is,  with  his  blinking  eyes 
and  his  scowling  look,  this  silent  tenant  pleased 
me,  and  I  hastened  to  beg  him  to  renew  his  lease. 
He  now  occupies,  as  before,  the  whole  upper  part 
of  the  mill  with  an  entrance  from  the  roof;  I  re- 
serve to  myself  the  lower  room,  a  small  white- 
washed room,  low  and  vaulted  like  a  convent 
refectory. 

It  is  from  there  that  I  write  to  you,  with  the 
door  wide  open  to  the  good  sun. 

A  pretty  pine  wood,  sparkling  with  light,  runs 
down  before  me  to  the  foot  of  the  slope.  On  the 
horizon,  the  Alpilles  outline  their  delicate  crests. 
No  noise.  Faintly,  afar,  the  sound  of  a  fife,  a  cur- 
lew amid  the  lavender,  the  mule-bells  on  the  high- 
way. .  .  All  this  beautiful  ProvenQal  landscape 
lives  by  light. 

And  now,  think  you  I  could  regret  your  noisy, 
darksome  Paris  ?  I  am  so  well-off  in  my  mill !  It 
is  so  exactly  the  spot  I  was  looking  for,  a  warm 
little  fragrant  corner,  far  from  newspapers,  cabs, 
and  fog !  .  .  And  what  pretty  things  about  me ! 
It  is  scarcely  a  week  since  I  came,  and  yet  my 
head  is  already  stuffed  full  of  impressions  and 
memories.  Tenez !  no  later  than  last  evening  I 
watched  the  return  of  the  flocks  to  the  mas  (farm) 
which  stands  at  the  foot  of  the  slope;  and  I  de- 


Taking  Possession.  3 

clare  to  you  I  would  not  give  that  sight  for  all  the 
"  first  nights "  that  you  have  had  in  Paris  this 
week.  You  shall  judge. 

I  must  tell  you  that  in  Provence  it  is  the  custom, 
as  it  is  in  Switzerland,  to  send  the  flocks  to  the 
mountains  on  the  coming  of  hot  weather.  Ani- 
mals and  men  spend  five  or  six  months  up  there 
under  the  stars,  in  grass  to  their  bellies;  then, 
at  the  first  chill  of  autumn,  down  they  come  to  the 
mas  and  feed  after  that  on  the  little  gray  foot-hills 
that  are  fragrant  with  rosemary.  So  last  night 
they  came.  The  gates  awaited  them,  wide  open ; 
the  folds  were  filled  with  fresh  straw.  From  hour 
to  hour  the  people  said :  "  Now  they  are  at  Eygui- 
eres  —  now  at  the  Paradou."  Then,  all  of  a  sud- 
den, towards  evening,  a  great  shout :  "  Here  they 
come !  "  and  away  off  in  the  distance  I  could  see 
the  flocks  advancing  in  a  halo  of  dust.  The  whole 
road  seemed  to  be  marching  with  them.  The  old 
rams  came  first,  horns  in  front  with  a  savage  air ; 
after  them  the  ruck  of  the  sheep,  the  mothers 
rather  weary,  their  nurslings  beside  them;  the 
mules,  with  red  pompons,  carrying  in  baskets 
the  day-old  lambkins,  which  they  rocked  as  they 
walked ;  then  came  the  dogs,  their  tongues  to 
earth,  perspiring,  and  two  tall  shepherd  rascals 
swathed  in  red  serge  mantles  which  fell  to  their 
heels  like  copes. 

All  this  defiles  before  me  joyously  with  a  pat- 
tering sound  like  rain,  and  is  swallowed  through 
the  gateway.  You  should  see  what  excitement 
in  the  farm !  From  their  high  perches  the  green 


4  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

and  gold  peacocks  with  their  tulle  crests,  have 
recognized  the  new-comers  and  hail  them  with, 
a  formidable  trumpet-blast.  The  poultry  yard, 
which  was  going  to  sleep,  wakes  up  with  a  start. 
All  are  afoot,  pigeons,  ducks,  turkeys,  guinea-fowl. 
They  all  seem  crazy;  even  the  hens  talk  of  sitting 
up  all  night !  One  would  really  think  that  each 
sheep  had  brought  back  in  its  wool  with  the  fra- 
grance of  the  wild  Alp  a  little  of  that  keen  moun- 
tain air  which  intoxicates  and  sets  one  dancing. 

In  the  midst  of  all  this  racket,  the  flocks  regain 
their  abode.  Nothing  can  be  more  charming  than 
this  re-entrance.  The  old  rams  are  tenderly  moved 
at  seeing  their  old  cribs;  the  lambs,  even  the  little 
ones  born  on  the  journey  who  had  never  seen  the 
farm,  look  about  them  in  amazement. 

But  most  touching  of  all  are  the  dogs,  those 
brave  shepherd  dogs,  full  of  business  about  their 
flocks  and  seeing  nought  else  in  the  mas.  In  vain 
does  the  watch-dog  call  to  them  from  his  kennel ; 
the  well-bucket  full  of  fresh  water  entices  them  in 
vain ;  they  see  nothing,  hear  nothing  till  the  flocks 
are  housed,  the  big  bolt  run  on  the  wicket  gate, 
and  the  shepherds  at  table  in  the  lower  room. 
Then  and  not  till  then,  they  consent  to  go  to 
kennel,  and  there,  while  lapping  their  porringers 
of  soup,  they  tell  their  farm  comrades  what  things 
they  have  done  up  there  on  the  mountains,  a 
gloomy  place,  where  there  are  wolves,  and  great 
crimson  foxgloves  full  of  dew  to  the  brim. 


The  Beaucaire  Diligence. 


II. 

THE   BEAUCAIRE   DILIGENCE. 

IT  was  the  day  of  my  arrival  at  this  place.  I 
had  taken  the  diligence  of  Beaucaire,  a  worthy 
old  vehicle  that  has  no  great  distance  to  go  before 
she  gets  home,  but  which  loiters,  nevertheless,  by 
the  way,  to  have  an  air,  in  the  evening,  of  coming 
from  afar.  We  were  five  on  the  imperial,  not 
counting  the  conductor. 

First,  a  keeper  of  the  Camargue,  a  small,  stocky, 
hairy  man,  smelling  of  his  wild  life,  with  big, 
bloodshot  eyes  and  silver  ear-rings.  Then  two 
Beaucairese,  a  baker  and  his  journeyman,  both 
very  red,  very  short-winded,  but  splendid  in  profile, 
two  Roman  coins  bearing  the  effigy  of  Vitellius. 
Lastly,  on  the  front  seat,  beside  the  conductor,  a 
man  —  no,  a  cap,  an  enormous  squirrel-skin  cap, 
who  said  little  or  nothing  and  gazed  at  the  road 
with  a  melancholy  air. 

All  these  persons  knew  each  other,  and  talked 
aloud  of  their  affairs  very  freely.  The  man  of  the 
Camargue  told  that  he  was  coming  from  Nimes, 
where  he  had  been  summoned  before  an  examin- 
ing-judge  to  answer  for  a  blow  with  a  scythe  given 
to  a  shepherd.  They  have  such  hot  blood  in 
Camargue !  —  and  in  Beaucaire  too !  Did  not 
these  very  two  Beaucairese  try  to  cut  each  other's 


6  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

throats  apropos  of  the  Blessed  Virgin?  It  seemed 
that  the  baker  belonged  to  a  parish  church  that 
was  vowed  to  the  Madonna,  the  one  whom  the 
Provencals  call  "  the  good  mother"  and  who  car- 
ries the  little  Jesus  in  her  arms.  The  journeyman, 
on  the  contrary,  sang  in  the  choir  of  a  new  church 
dedicated  to  the  Immaculate  Conception,  that  beau- 
tiful smiling  image  represented  with  pendent  arms 
and  her  hands  full  of  sun-rays.  Hence  the  quarrel. 
You  ought  to  have  seen  how  those  two  good 
Catholics  treated  each  other,  they  and  their 
madonnas :  — 

"  She  is  a  pretty  one,  your  immaculate  !  " 

"  Get  away  with  your  good  mother  !  " 

"  She  saw  queer  things,  that  one  of  yours,  in 
Palestine ! " 

"  And  yours,  hoo !  the  fright !  Who  knows 
what  she  didn't  do?  Ask  Saint  Joseph." 

As  if  to  remind  me  of  the  harbour  of  Naples, 
knives  were  on  the  point  of  glittering,  and,  upon 
my  word,  I  believe  the  theological  battle  would 
have  ended  that  way  if  the  conductor  had  not 
come  to  the  rescue. 

"  Let  us  alone  with  your  madonnas,"  he  said,  laugh- 
ing, to  the  two  Beaucairese ;  "  all  that  is  women's 
talk,  men  should  n't  meddle  in  such  things." 

Thereupon  he  cracked  his  whip  with  a  scepti- 
cal little  air  which  brought  every  one  round  to  his 
opinion. 

The  discussion  ended ;  but  the  baker,  set  a-go- 
ing, felt  the  need  of  letting  out  the  remains  of 


The  Beaucaire  Diligence.  7 

his  ardour ;  so,  turning  to  the  unfortunate  cap,  sad 
and  silent  in  his  corner,  he  said  with  a  jeering  air : 

"  And  your  wife,  knife-grinder,  what  parish  does 
she  belong  to  now?  " 

It  is  to  be  supposed  that  some  very  comical 
meaning  was  in  those  words,  for  the  whole  impe- 
rial went  off  into  roars  of  laughter.  The  knife- 
grinder  alone  did  not  laugh.  He  seemed  not  to 
hear.  Observing  that,  the  baker  turned  to  me. 

"  You  don't  know  about  his  wife,  monsieur ;  a 
queer  one,  I  can  tell  you.  There  are  not  two  like 
her  in  all  Beaucaire." 

The  laughs  redoubled.  The  knife-grinder  did 
not  stir ;  he  contented  himself  by  saying  in  a  low 
voice :  — 

"  Hold  your  tongue,  baker." 

But  that  devil  of  a  baker  had  no  idea  of  holding 
his  tongue,  and  he  began  again,  more  jeering  than 
ever : — 

"  Vitdase  !  The  comrade  is  not  to  be  pitied  for 
having  a  wife  like  that.  Can't  be  bored  one  minute 
with  her.  Just  think  !  a  beauty  who  gets  some  one 
to  elope  with  her  every  six  months  has  plenty  to 
tell  you  when  she  comes  back.  But  for  all  that, 
it  is  a  queer  little  household.  Just  imagine,  mon- 
sieur, they  hadn't  been  married  a  year  when,  paf! 
away  went  the  wife  to  Spain  with  a  chocolate- 
maker.  The  husband,  he  stayed  at  home,  weep- 
ing and  drinking.  He  was  almost  crazy.  By  and 
by  the  wife  came  home,  dressed  as  a  Spanish  girl 
and  carrying  a  tambourine.  We  all  said  to  her: 
'  Hide,  hide,  he  '11  kill  you  ! '  Kill  her,  indeed  !  not 


8  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

he !  They  lived  together  as  tranquil  as  ever,  and 
she  taught  him  to  play  the  tambourine." 

Here  a  fresh  explosion  of  laughter.  In  his 
corner,  without  raising  his  head,  the  knife-grinder 
murmured  again :  — 

"  Hold  your  tongue,  baker." 

The  baker  paid  no  attention,  but  continued :  — 

"  You  may  perhaps  think,  monsieur,  that  after 
her  return  from  Spain  the  beauty  would  have  kept 
quiet.  Not  she !  The  husband  had  taken  the 
thing  so  well,  she  thought  she  would  try  again. 
After  the  Spaniard  came  an  officer,  then  a  Rhone 
boatman,  then  a  musician,  then  a — I  don't  know 
who.  The  funny  thing  is  that  each  time  it  is  the 
same  comedy.  The  wife  elopes,  the  husband 
weeps ;  she  returns  and  he  's  consoled.  And  still 
she  is  carried  off,  and  still  he  takes  her  back.  Don't 
you  think  he  has  patience,  that  husband  ?  It  must 
be  said  that  she  is  mighty  pretty,  that  little  woman, 
a  cardinal's  dainty  bit,  lively,  dimpled,  plump,  with 
a  white  skin7  and  a  pair  of  nut-brown  eyes  that  look 
at  the  men  with  a  laugh.  F  faith,  Parisian,  if  you 
ever  come  back  through  Beaucaire  —  " 

"  Oh !  hold  your  tongue,  baker,  I  beg  of  you," 
said  the  unfortunate  man  again,  in  a  heart-rending 
tone  of  voice. 

At  this  moment  the  diligence  stopped.  We 
had  reached  the  mas  des  Angloires.  The  two 
bakers  got  out,  and  I  assure  you  I  did  not  regret 
them.  Sorry  jester!  We  could  hear  him  still 
laughing  in  the  farm-yard. 

The  bakers  having  departed  and  the  Camargue 


The  Beaucaire  Diligence.  9 

man  being  left  at  Aries,  the  imperial  seemed  empty. 
The  conductor  got  down  and  walked  beside  his 
horses.  We  were  alone  in  our  corners,  the  knife- 
grinder  and  I,  without  speaking.  It  was  hot ;  the 
leather  hood  of  the  vehicle  seemed  burning.  At 
times  I  felt  my  eyes  closing  and  my  head  getting 
heavy,  but  I  could  not  sleep.  Always  in  my  ears 
I  heard  that  "  Hold  your  tongue,  I  beg  of  you," 
so  gentle  yet  so  agonizing.  Neither  could  he,  the 
poor  soul,  sleep.  From  behind  I  saw  his  big 
shoulders  shudder  and  his  hand  —  a  long,  pallid, 
stupid  hand  —  trembling  on  the  back  of  the  seat, 
like  the  hand  of  an  aged  man.  He  wept. 

"  Here  you  are,  at  your  place,  Parisian,"  cried 
the  conductor,  suddenly,  pointing  with  the  end  of 
his  whip  to  my  green  hill  with  the  windmill 
pinned  upon  it  like  a  big  butterfly. 

I  hastened  to  get  out.  Passing  the  knife-grinder 
I  tried  to  look  at  him  beneath  his  cap ;  I  wanted 
to  see  him  before  I  left.  As  if  he  had  fathomed 
my  thought,  the  unhappy  man  raised  his  head 
abruptly  and  planting  his  eyes  in  mine  he  said  in 
a  hollow  voice :  — 

"  Look  at  me  well,  friend ;  and  if,  one  of  these 
days,  you  hear  there  has  been  trouble  in  Beaucaire 
you  can  say  that  you  know  the  man  who  struck  the 
blow." 

The  face  was  dull  and  sad,  with  small  and  faded 
eyes.  There  were  tears  in  those  eyes ;  but  in  the 
voice  there  was  hatred.  Hatred  is  the  anger  of 
the  weak !  If  I  were  that  wife,  I  should  beware 
of  it. 


io  Letters  from  My  MilL 


III. 
THE  SECRET  OF   MAlTRE   CORNILLE. 

FRANCET  MAMAI,  an  old  fife-player,  who  comes 
from  time  to  time  to  make  a  night  of  it  with  me, 
drinking  boiled  wine,  related  the  other  evening 
a  little  village  drama  of  which  my  mill  was  the  wit- 
ness some  twenty  years  ago.  The  old  man's  story 
touched  me,  and  I  shall  try  to  tell  it  to  you  just  as 
I  heard  it. 

Imagine,  for  the  moment,  my  dear  readers,  that 
you  are  sitting  before  a  pot  of  fragrant  wine  and 
that  an  old  Provencal  fife-player  is  speaking  to 
you. 

Our  countryside,  my  good  monsieur,  was  not 
always  such  a  dead  region  and  without  renown  as 
it  is  to-day.  There  was  a  time  when  the  millers 
did  a  great  trade,  and  from  ten  leagues  round  the 
farmers  brought  us  their  wheat  to  grind.  The 
hills  all  about  the  village  were  covered  with  wind- 
mills. To  right  and  left  one  saw  nothing  but  sails 
twirling  to  the  mistral  above  the  pines,  strings  of 
little  donkeys  laden  with  sacks  going  up  and  down 
the  roads ;  and  all  the  week  it  was  a  pleasure  to 
hear  on  the  heights  the  crack  of  the  whips,  the 
rattle  of  the  sails  and  the  Dia  hue  !  of  the  millers' 


The  Secret  of  Mattre  Cornille.        1 1 

men.  On  Sundays  we  went  to  the  mills  in  parties. 
The  millers,  they  paid  for  the  muscat.  The  wives 
were  as  fine  as  queens,  with  their  lace  kerchiefs 
and  their  gold  crosses.  I  took  my  fife  and  till 
it  was  pitch-dark  night  they  danced  the  farandole. 
Those  mills,  you  see,  they  made  the  joy  and  the 
wealth  of  our  parts. 

Unluckily  the  Paris  Frenchmen  took  an  idea 
to  establish  a  steam  flour-mill  on  the  road  to  Taras- 
con.  Fine  thing,  great  novelty !  People  took  a 
habit  of  sending  their  wheat  to  the  flour-dealers, 
and  the  poor  windmills  were  left  without  work. 
For  some  time  they  tried  to  struggle,  but  steam 
was  the  stronger,  and,  one  after  the  other,  ptcaire  ! 
they  were  forced  to  shut  up.  No  more  files  of 
little  donkeys.  The  handsome  wives  had  to  sell 
their  gold  crosses.  No  more  muscat!  no  more 
farandole !  The  mistral  might  blow,  but  the  sails 
stood  still.  And  then,  one  fine  day,  the  village 
rulers  ordered  all  those  mills  pulled  down  and 
their  place  to  be  sown  with  vines  and  olives. 

But  in  the  midst  of  this  general  downfall  one 
mill  held  good  and  continued  to  turn  courageously 
on  its  knoll  before  the  very  nose  of  the  steam- 
millers.  That  was  Maitre  Cornille's  mill,  the  very 
one  where  we  are  at  this  moment. 

Maitre  Cornille  was  an  old  miller,  living  for 
sixty  years  in  flour  and  mad  for  his  business. 
The  coming  of  the  steam-millers  had  really  made 
him  half  crazy.  For  a  week  he  ran  about  the 
village  inciting  the  people  and  shouting  with  all 


1 2  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

his  might  that  they  wanted  to  poison  Provence 
with  steam  flour.  "  Don't  go  there,"  he  cried ; 
"  those  brigands  in  making  bread  use  steam,  an 
invention  of  the  devil,  whereas  I  work  by  the 
mistral  and  the  tramontana,  which  are  the  breath 
of  the  good  God."  And  he  spoke  out  a  lot  of  fine 
sayings  like  that  in  praise  of  the  windmills,  but 
noboay  listened  to  them. 

Then,  in  a  fury,  the  old  fellow  shut  himself  up  in 
his  mill  and  lived  alone,  like  a  savage  beast.  He 
would  not  even  keep  his  little  granddaughter, 
Vivette,  with  him,  a  child  of  fifteen,  who,  since 
the  death  of  her  parents,  had  no  one  but  her 
grand  in  the  world.  The  poor  little  thing  was  now 
obliged  to  earn  her  living,  and  to  hire  herself  out 
in  the  farms  wherever  she  could,  for  the  harvest, 
the  silk-worm  times,  and  the  olive-picking.  And 
yet  her  grandfather  seemed  to  love  her,  that  child. 
He  would  often  go  his  four  leagues  afoot,  in  the 
hot  sun  to  see  her  at  the  farm  where  she  worked ; 
and  when  he  was  near  her  he  would  spend  whole 
hours  gazing  at  her  and  weeping. 

In  the  neighbourhood,  people  thought  that  the 
old  miller  was  niggardly  in  sending  Vivette  away, 
and  they  said  that  it  did  not  do  him  credit  to  let 
his  granddaughter  roam  from  one  farmhouse  to 
another,  exposed  to  the  brutality  of  the  bailiffs 
and  to  all  the  miseries  of  young  girls  in  her  condi- 
tion. And  they  also  thought  it  very  wrong  of 
Maitre  Cornille,  who  up  to  this  time  had  respected 
himself,  to  go  about  the  streets  like  a  regular 
gypsy,  barefooted,  cap  in  holes,  and  trousers 


The  Secret  of  Mattre  Cornille.         1 3 

ragged.  In  fact,  on  Sundays,  when  we  saw  him 
come  in  to  mass,  we  were  ashamed  of  him,  we 
old  fellows ;  and  Cornille  felt  it  so  much  that  he 
dared  not  come  and  sit  upon  the  workmen's  bench. 
He  always  stayed  at  the  end  of  the  church,  close 
to  the  holy-water  basin,  among  the  paupers. 

In  Maitre  Cornille's  life  there  was  something 
we  could  not  make  out.  For  a  long  time  past  no 
one  in  the  village  had  taken  him  wheat,  yet  the 
sails  of  his  mill  were  always  turning,  as  before. 
At  night  the  old  miller  was  met  upon  the  roads, 
driving  before  him  his  donkey  laden  with  stout 
sacks  of  flour. 

"  Good  vespers,  Maitre  Cornille  !  "  the  peasants 
would  call  to  him.  "  So  the  mill  is  going  still?" 

"  Going  still,  my  sons,"  the  old  fellow  answered 
with  a  lively  air.  "  Thank  God,  it  is  not  work  that 
we  lack." 

Then,  if  any  one  asked  him  where  the  devil  he 
found  all  that  work,  he  would  lay  a  ringer  on  his 
lips  and  answer,  gravely :  "  Mum  's  the  word  !  I 
am  working  for  exportation."  And  never  could 
anything  further  be  got  out  of  him. 

As  for  putting  your  nose  in  his  mill,  that  was  not 
to  be  thought  of.  Little  Vivette  herself  was  not 
allowed  to  enter. 

If  we  passed  in  front  of  it,  the  door  was  always 
seen  to  be  closed,  the  heavy  sails  were  in  motion, 
the  old  donkey  was  browsing  on  the  turf  of  the 
platform,  and  a  tall,  thin  cat,  taking  the  sun  on  the 
sill  of  the  window,  looked  at  us  malignantly. 

All  this  had  the  scent  of  some  mystery  about  it, 


14  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

and  made  people  gossip.  Every  one  explained  in 
his  own  way  the  secret  of  Maitre  Cornille,  but  the 
general  rumour  was  that  there  were  even  more 
sacks  of  silver  crowns  in  the  mill  than  sacks  of 
flour. 

In  the  end,  however,  all  was  found  out ;  and  this 
was  how:  — 

I  discovered,  one  fine  day,  while  making  the 
young  people  dance  with  my  fife,  that  the  eldest 
of  my  sons  and  little  Vivette  were  in  love  with  each 
other.  In  my  heart  I  was  n't  sorry,  because,  after 
all,  the  name  of  Cornille  was  held  in  honour  among 
us,  and,  besides,  I  knew  it  would  give  me  pleasure 
to  see  that  pretty  little  sparrow  of  a  Vivette  hop- 
ping about  my  house.  Only,  as  the  lovers  had 
many  occasions  to  be  together,  I  wished,  for  fear 
of  accidents,  to  settle  the  thing  at  once.  So  up  I 
went  to  the  mill  to  say  a  word  or  two  to  the  grand- 
father. Ah !  the  old  wizard !  you  should  just 
have  seen  the  way  he  received  me !  Impossible 
to  make  him  open  the  door.  I  explained  the  mat- 
ter as  well  as  I  could  through  the  keyhole;  and 
all  the  while  that  I  was  speaking,  that  rascally  lean 
cat  was  puffing  like  a  devil  above  my  head. 

The  old  man  did  n't  give  me  time  to  finish,  but 
shouted  to  me,  most  uncivilly,  to  get  back  to  my 
fife,  and  that  if  I  was  in  such  a  hurry  to  marry  my 
son,  I  could  go  and  get  a  girl  at  the  steam-mill. 
You  can  think  if  my  blood  did  n't  rise  to  hear  such 
words ;  but,  all  the  same,  I  had  wisdom  enough  to 
control  myself,  and,  leaving  the  old  madman  in  his 


The  Secret  of  Maltre  Cornille.        1 5 

mill,  I  returned  to  tell  the  children  of  my  failure. 
Poor  lambs  !  they  could  not  believe  it ;  they  begged 
me,  as  a  favour,  to  let  them  go  to  the  mill  them- 
selves and  speak  to  grandpapa.  I  had  n't  the 
courage  to  refuse,  and  prrrt !  off  went  my  lovers. 

When  they  got  to  the  mill,  Maitre  Cornille  had 
just  gone  out.  The  door  was  locked  and  double- 
locked,  but  the  old  man  had  left  his  ladder  outside, 
and  immediately  the  idea  came  to  the  children  to 
get  in  through  the  window  and  see  what  was  really 
going  on  inside  of  the  famous  mill. 

Singular  thing !  the  room  of  the  millstone  was 
empty.  Not  a  sack,  not  a  grain  of  wheat,  not  the 
slightest  sign  of  flour  on  the  walls  or  the  spiders' 
webs  !  There  was  not  even  that  good  warm  smell 
of  crushed  wheat  that  scents  a  mill  so  pleasantly. 
The  horizontal  bar  was  covered  with  dust,  and  the 
great  lean  cat  was  sleeping  on  it. 

The  lower  room  had  the  same  air  of  utter  pov- 
erty and  abandonment,  —  a  wretched  bed,  a  few 
rags,  a  morsel  of  bread  on  a  step  of  the  stair- 
way, and,  in  a  corner,  three  or  four  worn-out 
sacks,  from  which  oozed  plaster  rubbish  and  chalky 
earth. 

There  was  the  secret  of  Mattre  Cornille  !  It  was 
plaster  rubbish  that  he  carried  in  the  evening 
along  the  roads  to  save  the  honour  of  the  mill  and 
to  make  believe  it  was  grinding  flour  !  Poor  mill ! 
Poor  Cornille  !  For  many  a  long  day  the  steam- 
mill  had  robbed  them  of  their  last  customer.  The 
sails  still  turned,  but  the  millstone  revolved  in  a 
void. 


1 6  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

The  children  returned  in  tears,  and  told  me 
what  they  had  seen.  My  heart  almost  burst  as  I 
listened.  Not  losing  a  minute,  I  ran  to  the  neigh- 
bours ;  I  told  them  the  thing  in  a  word,  and  we  all 
agreed  that  we  must  at  once  carry  what  wheat 
there  was  in  the  village  to  Cornille's  mill.  No 
sooner  said  than  done.  The  whole  village  started, 
and  we  arrived  at  the  top  with  a  procession  of  don- 
keys laden  with  wheat,  —  real  wheat,  that  was ! 

The  mill  was  wide  open.  Before  the  door 
Maitre  Cornille,  seated  on  a  sack  of  plaster,  was 
weeping,  his  head  in  his  hands.  He  had  just  dis- 
covered, on  returning,  that  during  his  absence 
some  one  had  entered  the  mill  and  surprised  his 
sad  secret. 

"  Poor  me  !  "  he  was  saying.  "  There  's  nothing 
for  me  to  do  now  but  to  die.  The  mill  is  dis- 
honoured." 

And  he  sobbed  to  break  one's  heart,  calling  his 
mill  all  sorts  of  names,  and  talking  to  it  as  if  to  a 
real  person. 

At  this  moment  the  donkeys  appeared  on  the 
terrace,  and  we  all  began  to  shout  very  loud,  as  in 
the  good  old  days  of  the  millers :  — 

"  Ohe  !  the  mill !     Ohe  !  Maitre  Cornille  !  " 

And  there  were  the  sacks  piled  up  before  the 
door,  and  the  fine  ruddy  grain  spilling  over  to 
the  ground  on  all  sides. 

Maitre  Cornille  opened  his  eyes  very  wide.  In 
the  hollow  of  his  old  hand  he  scooped  up  some  of 
the  wheat  and  said,  laughing  and  weeping  to- 
gether :  — 


Tfie  Secret  of  Maltre  Cornille.         1 7 

"  It  is  wheat !  .  .  Lord  God  !  .  .  Good  wheat ! 
Let  me  alone,  let  me  look  at  it." 

Then,  turning  towards  us,  he  added :  — 

"  Ah !  I  knew  you  would  all  come  back  to  me. 
Those  steam-mill  fellows  are  thieves." 

We  wanted  to  carry  him  off  in  triumph  to  the 
village. 

"  No,  no,  children,"  he  said.  "  I  must  first  feed 
my  mill.  Just  think  how  long  it  is  since  she  had  a 
morsel  between  her  teeth  !  " 

And  we  all  had  tears  in  our  eyes  to  see  the  poor 
old  fellow  wandering  right  and  left,  opening  the 
sacks,  watching  the  millstone,  while  the  wheat  was 
being  crushed  and  the  fine  powdery  flour  flew  up 
to  the  ceiling. 

To  do  ourselves  justice,  I  must  tell  you  that 
from  that  day  we  never  let  the  old  miller  lack  for 
work.  Then,  one  morning,  Maitre  Cornille  died, 
and  the  sails  of  our  last  mill  ceased  to  turn —  for- 
ever, this  time.  Cornille  dead,  no  one  took  his 
place.  But  what  of  that,  monsieur?  All  things 
come  to  an  end  in  this  world,  and  we  must  believe 
that  the  days  of  windmills  are  over,  like  those  of 
the  barges  on  the  Rhone,  the  parliaments,  and  the 
grand  flowered  jackets. 


i8  Letters  from  My  Mill. 


IV. 

M.   SEGUIN'S   GOAT. 
TO   M.  PIERRE  GRINGOIRE,  LYRIC  POET  IN   PARIS. 

YOU  will  always  be  the  same,  my  poor  Grin- 
goire ! 

What !  a  place  is  offered  to  you  as  reporter  on 
one  of  the  best  Parisian  newspapers,  and  you  have 
the  coolness  to  refuse  it?  Look  at  yourself,  you 
luckless  fellow !  look  at  your  shabby  jacket,  those 
dilapidated  breeches,  and  that  thin  face  that  cries 
out  hunger.  It  is  to  this  that  your  passion  for 
noble  verse  has  brought  you !  This  is  what  your 
loyal  ten  years'  service  as  page  to  Sire  Apollo  has 
won!  On  the  whole,  are  you  not  ashamed  of  it? 

Come,  make  yourself  a  reporter,  imbecile ;  make 
yourself  a  reporter.  You  will  earn  good  crown- 
pieces,  and  have  your  knife  and  fork  at  Brabant's, 
and  you  can  exhibit  yourself  on  all  first  nights  with 
a  new  feather  in  your  cap. 

No?  What,  you  won't?  You  insist  on  living 
free  and  as  you  please  to  the  end  of  the  chapter? 
Well,  then !  listen  to  the  history  of  M.  Seguin's 
goat.  You  will  see  what  is  gained  by  wishing  to 
live  at  liberty. 

M.  Seguin  never  had  luck  with  his  goats.  He 
lost  them  in  all  kinds  of  ways.  One  fine  morning 


M.  Seguins  Goat.  19 

they  broke  their  tether  and  wandered  away  to  the 
mountain,  where  a  wolf  ate  them.  Neither  the 
caresses  of  their  master  nor  fear  of  the  wolf,  noth- 
ing could  restrain  them.  They  were,  it  appeared, 
independent  goats,  wanting  at  any  cost  free  air 
and  liberty. 

The  worthy  M.  Seguin,  who  did  not  understand 
the  nature  of  his  animals,  was  shocked.  He 
said: 

"  That 's  enough ;  goats  are  bored  by  living  with 
me ;  I  won't  keep  another." 

However,  after  losing  six  in  that  way,  he  was 
not  discouraged,  and  he  bought  a  seventh;  but 
this  time  he  was  careful  to  get  her  quite  young,  so 
young  that  she  might  the  better  get  accustomed  to 
live  with  him. 

Ah !  Gringoire,  she  was  pretty,  that  little  goat 
of  M.  Seguin's,  so  pretty  with  her  soft  eyes,  her 
little  tuft  of  beard  like  a  sub-officer,  her  black  and 
shiny  hoofs,  her  ribbed  horns,  and  her  long,  white 
hair  which  wrapped  her  like  a  mantle !  She  was 
almost  as  charming  as  that  kid  of  Esmeralda's  — 
you  remember,  Gringoire?  —  and  then,  so  docile, 
so  coaxing,  letting  herself  be  milked  without 
budging,  and  never  putting  her  foot  in  the  bowl ! 
A  love  of  a  little  goat ! 

Behind  M.  Seguin's  house  was  a  field  -hedged 
round  with  hawthorn.  It  was  there  that  he  put 
his  new  boarder.  He  fastened  her  to  a  stake,  at 
the  very  best  part  of  the  meadow,  taking  care  to 
give  her  plenty  of  rope ;  and  from  time  to  time  he 
went  to  see  if  she  was  satisfied.  The  goat  seemed 


20  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

very  happy,  and  cropped  the  grass  with  such  heart- 
iness that  M.  Seguin  was  delighted. 

"  At  last,"  thought  the  poor  man,  "  here  's  one 
at  least  that  is  n't  bored  by  living  with  me  !  " 

M.  Seguin  deceived  himself;  the  goat  was  bored. 

One  day  she  said  to  herself,  looking  at  the 
mountain :  — 

"  How  nice  it  must  be  up  there !  What  a 
pleasure  to  skip  in  the  heather,  without  this  cursed 
rope,  which  rubs  my  neck  !  It  is  all  very  well  for 
asses  and  cattle  to  browse  in  a  field,  but  goats ! 
why,  they  want  the  open." 

From  that  moment  the  grass  of  the  meadow 
seemed  to  her  insipid.  Ennui  seized  her.  She 
grew  thin,  her  milk  was  scanty.  It  was  really  pite- 
ous to  see  her,  straining  at  the  tether  all  day,  her 
head  turned  to  the  mountain,  her  nostril  flaming, 
and  she  saying  "  Ma-e  "  so  sadly. 

M.  Seguin  saw  that  something  was  the  matter 
with  his  goat,  but  he  did  not  know  what.  One 
morning,  after  he  had  milked  her,  the  goat  turned 
round  and  said  to  him  in  her  patois :  — 

"Listen,  M.  Seguin;  I  am  so  weary  here  with 
you ;  let  me  go  on  the  mountain." 

"  Ah  !  mon  Dieu  !  She,  too  !  "  cried  poor  M. 
Seguin,  stupefied,  and  he  let  fall  the  bowl ;  then, 
sitting  down  on  the  grass  at  the  side  of  his  goat, 
he  said :  — 

"  Oh  !  Blanchette,  would  you  leave  me?  " 

And  Blanchette  answered  :  — 

"  Yes,  M.  Seguin." 


M*  Seguiris  Goat.  21 

"  Is  n't  there  grass  enough  here  to  please  you?  " 

"  Oh  !  plenty,  M.  Seguin." 

"Do  I  tie  you  too  short?  shall  I  lengthen  the 
rope?" 

"  It  is  n't  worth  while,  M.  Seguin." 

"Then  what  is  the  matter?  what  do  you  want?" 

"  I  want  to  go  on  the  mountain,  M.  Seguin." 

"  But,  you  unhappy  little  thing,  don't  you  know 
there  are  wolves  on  the  mountain?  What  would 
you  do  if  a  wolf  attacked  you  ?  " 

"  I  'd  butt  him  with  my  horns." 

"  A  wolf  would  n't  care  for  your  horns.  He 
has  eaten  up  goats  of  mine  with  much  bigger 
horns  than  yours.  Don't  you  remember  that 
poor  old  Renaude  who  was  here  last  year? 
Strong  and  spiteful  as  a  ram.  She  fought  all 
night  with  the  wolf,  but,  in  the  morning,  the  wolf 
ate  her." 

"  Pecaire!  Poor  Renaude  !  But  that  does  not 
matter,  M.  Seguin;  let  me  go  to  the  mountain." 

"  Merciful  powers ! "  exclaimed  M.  Seguin, 
"  what  is  the  matter  with  my  goats  ?  Another 
one  for  the  wolf  to  eat !  Well,  no,  I  shall  save 
you  in  spite  of  yourself,  you  slut !  and  for  fear  you 
should  break  your  rope  I  shall  put  you  in  the 
stable,  and  there  you  will  stay." 

Whereupon  M.  Seguin  led  the  goat  into  his 
brand-new  stable,  and  double-locked  the  door. 
Unfortunately,  he  forgot  the  window,  and  hardly 
had  he  turned  his  back  before  the  little  one  was 
out  and  away. 

You   laugh,    Gringoire  ?     Parbleu !     I   suppose 


22  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

so;  you  take  the  side  of  the  goats  against  that 
good  M.  Seguin.  We  '11  see  if  you  laugh  presently. 

When  the  white  goat  reached  the  mountain  there 
was  general  delight.  Never  had  the  old  fir-trees 
seen  anything  so  pretty.  They  received  her  like  a 
little  princess.  The  chestnut-trees  bent  to  the 
ground  to  kiss  her  with  the  tips  of  their  branches. 
The  golden  gorse  opened  wide  to  let  her  pass,  and 
smelt  just  as  sweet  as  it  could.  In  fact,  the  whole 
mountain  welcomed  her. 

You  can  imagine,  Gringoire,  how  happy  she 
was !  No  more  rope,  no  stake,  nothing  to  prevent 
her  from  skipping  and  browsing  as  she  pleased. 
My  dear  fellow,  the  grass  was  above  her  horns ! 
and  such  grass !  —  luscious,  delicate,  toothsome, 
made  of  all  sorts  of  plants.  Quite  another  thing 
from  that  grass  in  the  meadow.  And  the  flowers, 
oh !  Great  blue  campanulas  and  crimson  fox- 
gloves with  their  long  calyxes,  a  perfect  forest  of 
wild-flowers  giving  out  an  intoxicating  sweetness. 

The  white  goat,  a  little  tipsy,  wallowed  in  the 
thick  of  them  with  her  legs  in  the  air,  and  rolled 
down  the  banks  pell-mell  with  the  falling  leaves 
and  the  chestnuts.  Then,  suddenly,  she  sprang 
to  her  feet  with  a  bound,  and  hop !  away  she 
went,  head  foremost,  through  thicket  and  bushes, 
now  on  a  rock,  now  in  a  gully,  up  there,  down 
there,  everywhere.  You  would  have  said  that 
ten  of  M.  Seguin's  goats  were  on  the  mountain. 

The  fact  is,  Blanchette  was  afraid  of  nothing. 

She  sprang  with  a  bound  over  torrents  that 
spattered  her  as  she  passed  with  a  dust  of  damp 


M.  Seguins  Goat.  23 

spray.  Then,  all  dripping,  she  would  stretch  her- 
self out  on  a  nice  flat  rock  and  dry  in  the  sun. 
Once,  coming  to  the  edge  of  a  slope  with  a  bit 
of  laurel  between  her  teeth,  she  saw  below,  far 
below  on  the  plain,  the  house  of  M.  Seguin  with 
the  meadow  behind  it;  and  she  laughed  till  she 
cried. 

"  How  small  it  is  !  "  she  said ;  "  how  could  I  ever 
have  lived  there  ?  " 

Poor  little  thing !  being  perched  so  high  she 
fancied  she  was  tall  as  the  world. 

Well !  it  was  a  good  day  for  M.  Seguin's  goat. 
About  noon,  running  from  right  to  left,  she  fell  in 
with  a  herd  of  chamois  munching  a  wild  vine  with 
all  their  teeth.  Among  them  our  little  white- 
gowned  rover  made  quite  a  sensation.  They  gave 
her  the  choicest  place  at  the  vine,  and  all  those 
gentlemen  were  very  gallant.  In  fact,  it  appears 
—  but  this  is  between  ourselves,  Gringoire  —  that 
a  young  chamois  with  a  black  coat  had  the  great 
good  fortune  to  please  Blanchette.  The  pair 
wandered  off  in  the  woods  for  an  hour  or  so,  and 
if  you  want  to  know  what  they  said  to  each  other, 
go  ask  those  chattering  brooks  that  are  running 
invisible  through  the  mosses. 

Suddenly  the  wind  freshened.  The  mountain 
grew  violet ;  it  was  dusk. 

"  Already  !  "  said  the  little  goat ;  and  she  stopped, 
quite  surprised. 

Below,  the  fields  were  drowned  in  mist.  M. 
Seguin's  meadow  disappeared  in  the  fog,  and 


24  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

nothing  could  be  seen  of  the  house  but  the  roof 
and  a  trifle  of  smoke.  She  heard  the  little  bells  of 
a  flock  that  was  on  its  way  home,  and  her  soul 
grew  sad.  A  falcon,  making  for  his  nest,  swept 
her  with  his  wings  as  he  passed.  She  shud- 
dered. Then  came  a  howl  on  the  mountain: 

"Hoo!  hoo!" 

She  thought  of  the  wolf;  all  day  that  silly  young 
thing  had  never  once  thought  of  it.  At  the  same 
moment  a  horn  sounded  far,  far  down  the  valley. 
It  was  that  good  M.  Seguin,  making  a  last  effort. 

"  Hoo  !  hoo  !  "  howled  the  wolf. 

"  Come  back  !  come  back  !  "  cried  the  horn. 

Blanchette  felt  a  wish  to  return,  but  remember- 
ing the  stake,  the  rope,  the  hedge  of  the  field,  she 
thought  that  she  never  could  endure  that  life  again 
and  'twas  better  to  remain  where  she  was. 

The  horn  ceased  to  sound. 

The  goat  heard  behind  her  the  rustling  of  leaves. 
She  turned  and  saw  in  the  shadow  two  short  ears, 
erect,  and  two  eyes  shining.  It  was  the  wolf. 

Enormous,  motionless,  seated  on  his  tail,  he 
was  looking  at  the  little  white  goat  and  smack- 
ing his  lips  in  advance.  As  he  knew  very  well  he 
should  eat  her  up,  the  wolf  was  not  in  a  hurry; 
but  when  she  turned  round  and  saw  him  he  began 
to  laugh  wickedly :  "  Ha !  ha !  M.  Seguin's  little 
goat !  — "  and  he  licked  his  great  red  tongue 
round  his  wily  chops. 

Blanchette  felt  she  was  lost.  For  an  instant,  re- 
membering the  story  of  old  Renaude,  who  had 


M.  Segnins  Goat.  25 

fought  all  night  only  to  be  eaten  in  the  morning, 
she  said  to  herself  that  'twas  better,  perhaps,  to  be 
eaten  at  once;  but  then,  thinking  otherwise,  she 
put  herself  on  guard,  head  low,  horns  forward,  like 
the  brave  little  goat  that  she  was.  Not  that  she 
had  any  hope  of  killing  the  wolf,  —  goats  can't  kill 
wolves,  —  but  only  to  see  if  she,  too,  could  hold 
out  as  long  as  old  Renaude. 

Then  the  monster  advanced,  and  the  pretty  little 
horns  began  the  dance. 

Ah !  the  brave  goatling !  with  what  heart  she 
went  at  it!  More  than  ten  times  —  I'm  not  ex- 
aggerating, Gringoire  —  more  than  ten  times  she 
forced  the  wolf  back  to  get  breath.  During  each 
of  these  momentary  truces  the  dainty  little  thing 
nibbled  one  more  blade  of  her  dearly  loved  grass ; 
then,  with  her  mouth  full,  she  returned  to  the  com- 
bat. It  lasted  all  through  the  night.  From  time 
to  time  M.  Seguin's  goat  looked  up  at  the  stars  as 
they  danced  on  the  cloudless  sky  and  said  to  her- 
self: — 

"  Oh  !  if  I  can  only  hold  out  till  dawn." 

One  after  another,  the  stars  went  out.  Blan- 
chette  redoubled  the  blows  of  her  horns,  and  the 
wolf  the  snap  of  his  teeth.  A  pale  gleam  showed 
on  the  horizon.  The  hoarse  crowing  of  a  cock 
rose  from  a  barnyard. 

/'  At  last ! "  said  the  poor  little  goat,  who  had 
only  awaited  the  dawn  to  die ;  and  she  stretched 
herself  out  on  the  ground  in  her  pretty  white  fur 
all  spotted  with  gore. 

Then  the  wolf  fell  upon  her  and  ate  her  up. 


26  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

Adieu,  Gringoire ! 

The  story  you  have  now  heard  is  not  a  tale  of 
my  own  invention.  If  ever  you  come  to  Provence, 
our  farmers  will  often  tell  you  of  la  cabro  de  Moussu 
Seguiu,  que  se  battfgue  touto  la  neui  emt  lou  loup,  e 
piei  lou  matin  lou  loup  la  mang/. 

You  understand  me,  Gringoire :  "  And  then,  in 
the  morning,  the  wolf  ate  her  up." 


The  Stars.  27 


THE  STARS. 
TALE   OF  A  PROVENCAL    SHEPHERD. 

IN  the  days  when  I  kept  sheep  on  the  Luberon, 
I  was  often  for  weeks  together  without  seeing  a  liv- 
ing soul,  alone  in  the  pastures  with  my  dog  Labri 
and  the  flock.  From  time  to  time  the  hermit  of 
the  Mont-de-1'Ure  passed  that  way  in  search  of 
simples ;  or  occasionally  I  saw  the  blackened  face 
of  some  Piedmontese  charcoal-burner;  but  these 
were  quiet  folk,  silent  by  force  of  solitude,  having 
lost  their  liking  for  talk,  and  knowing  nothing  of 
what  went  on  below  in  the  towns  and  villages.  So 
when  I  heard,  every  fortnight,  on  the  road  coming 
up  the  mountain,  the/bells  of  our  farm  mule  bring- 
ing me  food  for  J&e  next  two  weeks,  and  when  I 
saw,  appearing  little  by  little  above  the  slope,  the 
lively  head  of  our  miarro  (farm-boy)  or  the  red 
coif  of  old  Aunt  Norade,  I  was  really  very  happy. 
I  made  them  tell  me  all  the  news  of  the  world  down 
below,  the  baptisms,  the  marriages,  etc. ;  but  that 
which  interested  me  above  all  was  to  know  what 
the  daughter  of  my  master  was  about,  our  Demoi- 
selle Stephanette,  the  prettiest  young  lady  in  all 
the  country  round.  Without  seeming  to  take  great 
interest,  I  managed  to  find  out  when  she  went  to 


28  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

fetes  and  dances,  and  whether  she  had  new  lovers ; 
and  if  others  asked  me  what  such  things  mattered 
to  me,  a  poor  shepherd  on  a  mountain,  I  answered 
that  I  was  twenty  years  old,  and  that  Mademoiselle 
Stephanette  was  the  loveliest  thing  I  had  ever  seen 
in  my  life. 

Now  one  Sunday,  when  I  was  expecting  my  two 
weeks'  provisions,  it  happened  that  they  did  not 
come  until  very  late.  In  the  morning  I  said  to 
myself,  "  Tis  the  fault  of  high  mass ;  "  then,  about 
mid-day,  there  came  up  a  great  storm,  and  I  thought 
that  the  mule  could  not  start  on  account  of  the 
roads.  At  last,  about  three  o'clock,  when  the  sky 
was  washed  clear  and  the  mountain  was  shining 
with  sun  and  water,  I  heard  amid  the  dripping 
from  the  leaves  and  the  gurgle  of  the  overflowing 
brooks,  the  tinkle  of  the  mule-bells,  as  gay  and 
alert  as  the  grand  church  chimes  of  an  Easter-day. 
But  it  was  not  our  little  miarro,  nor  old  Aunt 
Norade  who  was  leading  him.  It  was  —  guess 
who  ?  Our  demoiselle,  my  children  !  our  demoiselle 
in  person,  sitting  up  straight  between  the  osier 
baskets,  quite  rosy  with  the  mountain  air  and  the 
refreshing  coolness  of  the  storm. 

The  boy  was  ill;  Aunt  Norade  was  off  for  a 
holiday  with  the  children.  The  beautiful  Stepha- 
nette told  me  all  this  as  she  got  off  the  mule,  and 
also  that  she  came  late  because  she  had  lost  her 
way ;  but  to  see  her  dressed  in  her  Sunday  best, 
with  her  flowered  ribbon,  her  brilliant  petticoat, 
and  her  laces,  I  must  say  she  had  more  the  look 
of  having  lingered  at  some  dance  than  of  search- 


The  Stars.  29 

ing  for  a  path  among  the  bushes.  Oh,  the  dainty 
creature !  My  eyes  never  wearied  of  looking  at 
her.  It  is  true  that  I  had  never  before  seen  her 
quite  so  near.  Sometimes,  in  winter,  when  the 
flocks  had  come  down  upon  the  plains  and  I 
returned  to  the  farmhouse  at  night  for  my  supper, 
she  would  cross  the  hall  quickly,  scarcely  speak- 
ing to  the  servants,  always  gayly  dressed  and 
perhaps  a  little  haughty.  And  now  I  had  her 
before  me,  all  to  myself!  Was  it  not  enough  to 
turn  my  head? 

When  she  had  taken  the  provisions  from  the 
basket  Stephanette  looked  about  her  with  curi- 
osity. Lifting  her  handsome  best  petticoat  slightly, 
for  it  might  have  got  injured,  she  entered  the 
cabin,  asked  to  see  where  I  slept,  —  in  a  trough 
full  of  straw  with  a  sheepskin  over  it,  —  looked  at 
my  big  cloak  hanging  to  the  wall,  my  crook,  and 
my  gun.  All  of  which  amused  her.  "  So  this  is 
where  you  live,  my  poor  shepherd  ? "  she  said. 
"  How  bored  you  must  be  all  alone.  What  do 
you  do?  What  do  you  think  about?"  I  had  a 
great  mind  to  answer,  "  Of  you,  my  mistress,"  and 
I  should  n't  have  lied ;  but  my  trouble  of  mind 
was  so  great  that  I  couldn't  so  much  as  find  a 
word.  I  think  she  noticed  this  and  the  mischiev- 
ous creature  took  pleasure  in  doubling  my  embar- 
rassment by  her  teasing.  "  And  your  sweetheart, 
shepherd ;  she  comes  to  see  you  sometimes,  does 
she  not?  I  am  sure  she  must  be  the  golden  kid,  or 
that  fairy  Estrella  who  flits  along  the  summits  of 
the  mountains."  And  she  herself  as  she  spoke  to 


30  Letters  from  My  Mill 

me  had  quite  the  air  of  the  fairy  Estrella,  with 
that  pretty  laugh  from  her  head  tossed  back,  and 
her  haste  to  be  off,  which  made  her  visit  seem 
much  like  a  vision.  "  Adieu,  shepherd." 

"  Your  servant,  mistress."  And  away  she  went, 
with  the  empty  baskets. 

When  she  passed  out  of  sight  down  the  sloping 
path  it  seemed  to  me  that  the  stones  rolled  away 
by  the  hoofs  of  the  mule  were  falling,  one  by  one, 
on  my  heart.  I  heard  them  a  long,  long  time; 
and  till  late  in  the  day  I  sat  as  if  dozing,  not 
daring  to  stir  for  fear  lest  my  vision  should  leave 
me. 

Towards  evening,  as  the  depths  of  the  valleys 
were  beginning  to  grow  blue,  and  the  creatures 
were  pressing  together  and  bleating  to  enter  the 
fold,  I  heard  myself  called  from  below,  and  I  saw 
our  young  lady,  no  longer  laughing  as  before,  but 
trembling  with  fear  and  cold  and  dampness.  It 
seems  she  had  found  at  the  base  of  the  slope  the 
river  Sorgue  so  swollen  by  the  storm  that,  being 
determined  to  cross  it,  she  came  near  getting 
drowned.  The  terrible  part  was  that  at  that  hour 
of  the  night  there  was  no  use  attempting  to  return 
to  the  farm,  because  she  never  could  have  found 
her  way  by  the  cross-road  all  by  herself,  and,  as 
for  me,  I  could  not  leave  my  flock.  The  idea  of 
passing  the  night  on  the  mountain  worried  her 
greatly,  especially  on  account  of  her  people's 
anxiety.  I  soothed  her  as  best  I  could.  "  The 
nights  are  so  short  in  July,  mistress  —  it  is  only  a 
moment's  trouble."  And  I  lighted  a  big  fire 


Phe  Stars.  31 

quickly  to  dry  her  little  feet  and  her  gown  all 
soaked  in  the  river.  After  which  I  brought  her 
some  milk  and  cheese;  but  the  poor  little  thing 
thought  neither  of  warmth  nor  of  food ;  and  when 
I  saw  the  big  tears  welling  up  in  her  eyes  I 
wanted  to  cry  myself. 

And  now  the  darkness  was  really  coming. 
Nothing  remained  on  the  crest  of  the  mountain 
but  a  dust  of  the  sun,  a  vapour  of  light  to  the 
westward.  I  asked  our  young  lady  to  enter  and 
rest  in  the  cabin ;  and  then,  having  stretched  a 
fine  new  sheepskin  on  a  pile  of  fresh  straw,  I 
wished  her  good-night  and  went  out  to  sit  by  my- 
self before  the  door.  God  is  my  witness  that,  in 
spite  of  the  fire  of  love  that  burned  my  blood,  no 
evil  thought  came  into  my  mind,  —  nothing  but  a 
great  pride  to  think  that  in  a  corner  of  my  hut, 
quite  close  to  the  flock  that  eyed  her  inquisitively, 
the  daughter  of  my  master,  a  lamb  more  precious 
and  snow-white  than  they,  was  sleeping,  intrusted 
to  my  care.  Never  did  the  heavens  seem  to  me 
so  deep,  the  stars  so  bright. 

Suddenly  the  wicket  opened  and  Stephanette 
appeared.  She  could  not  sleep.  The  creatures 
had  crackled  the  straw  as  they  moved,  or  else 
they  were  bleating  as  they  dreamed.  She  pre- 
ferred to  come  out  to  the  fire.  Seeing  this  I 
threw  my  goatskin  round  her  shoulders  and  blew 
up  a  flame,  and  there  we  stayed,  sitting  side  by 
side,  without  saying  a  word.  If  you  have  ever 
passed  a  night  beneath  the  stars  you  know  that 
during  the  hours  when  people  sleep  a  mysterious 


32  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

world  wakes  up  in  the  solitude  and  silence.  The 
springs  sing  clearer,  the  ponds  are  lighted  by 
little  flames.  All  the  spirits  of  the  mountain  go 
and  come  freely ;  there  's  rustling  in  the  air,  im- 
perceptible noises  as  if  we  could  hear  the  branches 
grow  and  the  grass  springing.  Day  is  the  life  of 
beings,  but  night  is  the  life  of  things.  If  you  are 
not  accustomed  to  it  't  is  alarming ;  and  so  our 
young  lady  shuddered  and  pressed  against  me  at 
the  slightest  noise.  Once  a  long,  melancholy  cry 
came  from  the  pond  that  shone  below  us,  rising 
in  undulations.  At  the  same  instant  a  beautiful 
shooting  star  glided  above  our  heads  in  the  same 
direction,  as  if  that  plaint  which  we  had  just 
heard  had  brought  light  with  it. 

"  What  is  that?  "  asked  Stephanette  in  a  whisper. 

"  A  soul  that  enters  paradise,  my  mistress,"  and  I 
made  the  sign  of  the  cross.  She  too  crossed  her- 
self, and  sat  for  a  moment  with  her  head  turned 
upward  to  the  sky,  reflecting.  Then  she  said  to 
me :  "  Is  it  true,  shepherd,  that  all  of  you  are 
wizards?" 

"  Not  so,  mistress.  But  here  we  live  closer  to 
the  stars,  and  we  know  what  goes  on  among  them 
better  than  the  people  of  the  plains." 

She  still  looked  upward,  resting  her  head  upon 
her  hand,  wrapped  in  the  goatskin,  like  a  little 
celestial  shepherd.  "  How  many  there  are  I  how 
beautiful !  Never  did  I  see  so  many.  Do  you 
know  their  names,  shepherd?" 

"  Why,  yes,  mistress.  .  .  See !  just  above  us, 
that's  the  Path  of  Saint  James  (the  Milky  Way). 


The  Stars.  33 

It  goes  from  France  to  Spain.  'T  was  Saint  James 
of  Galicia  who  marked  it  out  to  show  the  way  to 
our  brave  Charlemagne  when  he  made  war  upon  the 
Saracens.1  Farther  on,  there 's  the  Chariot  of  Souls 
(Great  Bear),  with  its  four  resplendent  axles.  The 
three  stars  before  it  are  its  three  steeds,  and  the 
little  one  close  to  the  third  is  the  charioteer.  Do 
you  see  that  rain  of  stars  falling  over  there?  Those 
are  the  souls  that  the  Good  God  won't  have  in 
heaven.  .  .  Lower  down  there  's  the  Rake  or  the 
Three  Kings  (Orion).  That  serves  us  for  a  clock, 
us  shepherds.  Merely  by  looking  at  them  now  I 
know  't  is  past  midnight.  Still  lower,  over  there 
to  the  southward,  shines  John  of  Milan,  the  torch 
of  the  stars  (Sirius).  Here 's  what  the  shepherds 
say  about  that  star:  It  seems  that  one  night  John 
of  Milan  with  the  Three  Kings  and  the  Poucintire 
(the  Pleiad)  were  invited  to  the  wedding  of  a 
star,  a  friend  of  theirs.  The  Poucintire,  being  in  a 
hurry,  started,  they  say,  the  first  and  took  the 
upper  road.  Look  at  her,  up  there,  in  the  depths 
of  the  sky.  The  Three  Kings  cut  across  and 
caught  up  with  her,  but  that  lazy  John  of  Milan, 
who  slept  too  late,  stayed  quite  behind,  and  being 
furious,  tried  to  stop  them  by  flinging  his  stick. 
That 's  why  the  Three  Kings  are  sometimes  called 
the  Stick  of  John  of  Milan.  .  .  But  the  most 
beautiful  of  all  the  stars,  mistress,  is  ours,  the 
Shepherd's  Star,  which  lights  us  at  dawn  of  day 
when  we  lead  out  the  flock,  and  at  night  when  we 

1  All  these  details  of  popular  astronomy  are  translated  from  the 
"  Provencal  Almanach,"  published  at  Avignon. 

3 


34  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

gather  it  in.  We  call  that  star  the  Maguelonne, 
the  beautiful  Maguelonne  which  runs  after  Pierre 
de  Provence  (Saturn),  and  marries  him  every  seven 
years." 

"  Why,  shepherd  !  do  stars  really  marry?" 

"  To  be  sure  they  do,  mistress." 

And  as  I  tried  to  explain  to  her  what  such  mar- 
riages were  I  felt  something  fresh  and  delicate  lie 
softly  on  my  shoulder.  'Twas  her  head,  weighed 
down  by  sleep,  which  rested  upon  me  with  a  dainty 
rustle  of  ribbons  and  laces  and  waving  hair.  She 
stayed  thus,  never  moving,  till  the  stars  in  the  sky 
grew  pale,  dimmed  by  the  rising  day.  As  for  me, 
I  looked  at  her  sleeping,  a  little  shaken  in  the 
depths  of  my  being,  but  sacredly  protected  by  that 
clear  night,  which  has  never  given  me  any  but 
noble  thoughts.  Around  us  the  stars  continued 
their  silent  way,  docile  as  a  flock,  and  at  times  I 
fancied  that  one  of  them,  the  most  delicate,  the 
most  brilliant,  had  lost  its  way  and  had  come 
down  to  rest  upon  my  shoulder  and  sleep. 


"She  stayed  thus,  never  moving,  till  the  stars  in 
the  sky  grew  pale:' 


The  Arlesian  Girl  35 


THE   ARLESIAN   GIRL. 

GOING  down  from  my  mill  to  the  village  I  pass 
a  farmhouse  built  close  to  the  road  at  the  end  of  a 
great  courtyard  planted  with  hazel-trees.  It  is  the 
true  home  of  a  Proven£al  farmer,  with  its  red  tiles, 
its  broad  brown  front  and  irregular  windows,  and 
above,  at  the  peak  of  the  garret,  a  weather-vane, 
pulleys  to  hoist  the  forage,  and  a  few  tufts  of  hay 
caught  in  the  transit. 

Why  did  that  house  so  affect  me?  Why  did 
that  closed  portal  seem  to  wring  my  heart?  I 
could  not  have  told  why,  and  yet  that  home  always 
gave  me  a  chill.  There  was  silence  around  it. 
When  any  one  passed,  the  dogs  did  not  bark,  the 
guinea-fowls  fled  without  screaming.  Within,  not 
a  voice!  Nothing,  not  so  much  as  a  mule-bell. 
If  it  were  not  for  the  white  curtains  at  the  windows 
and  the  smoke  that  rose  from  the  roof,  the  place 
might  have  seemed  uninhabited. 

Yesterday,  on  the  stroke  of  midday,  I  was  return- 
ing from  the  village  and,  to  escape  the  sun,  I  was 
hugging  the  walls  of  the  farm  in  the  shade  of  the 
hazel-trees.  On  the  road,  directly  in  front  of 
the  courtyard,  silent  serving-men  were  loading  a 
waggon  with  hay.  The  gates  were  open.  I  cast 


36  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

in  a  look  as  I  passed,  and  I  saw,  at  the  farther  end 
of  the  courtyard,  his  head  in  his  hands  and  his 
elbows  on  a  large  stone  table,  a  tall  old  man, 
white-headed,  in  a  jacket  too  short  for  him,  and 
ragged  breeches.  I  stopped.  One  of  the  men 
said  to  me  in  a  low  voice :  — 

"  Hush  !  't  is  the  master.  He  is  like  that  since 
the  misfortune  of  his  son." 

At  this  moment  a  woman  and  a  little  boy  dressed 
in  black,  passed  near  to  us  carrying  large  gilt 
prayer-books,  and  entered  the  farmhouse. 

The  man  added  :  — 

" That's  the  mistress  and  Cadet,  returning  from 
mass.  They  go  there  every  day  since  the  lad 
killed  himself.  Ah  !  monsieur,  what  desolation  ! 
The  master  still  wears  the  dead  boy's  clothes; 
they  can't  make  him  quit  them.  Dial  hue! 
Gee  up !  " 

The  waggon  started.  I,  who  wanted  to  know 
more,  asked  the  driver  to  let  me  get  up  beside 
him ;  and  it  was  there,  seated  on  the  hay,  that  1 
heard  this  heart-breaking  story. 

He  was  called  Jan.  A  fine  young  peasant,  twenty 
years  of  age,  virtuous  as  a  girl,  firm,  with  a  frank 
face,  and  very  handsome ;  so  the  women  looked  at 
him ;  but  as  for  him  he  had  only  one  woman  in  his 
head,  —  a  little  Arlesian  girl,  all  velvet  and  laces, 
whom  he  met  one  day  at  Aries,  on  the  Lice.  At 
the  farmhouse  this  acquaintance  was  not  viewed, 
at  first,  with  satisfaction.  The  girl  was  thought 
coquettish,  and  her  parents  were  not  of  the  neigh- 


The  Artesian  Girl.  37 

bourhood.  But  Jan  wanted  his  Arlesian  love  with 
all  his  might.  He  said  :  — 

"  I  shall  die  if  they  don't  give  her  to  me." 

They  had  to  come  to  it.  It  was  settled  that  the 
marriage  should  take  place  after  harvest. 

One  Sunday  evening,  in  the  large  courtyard,  the 
family  were  finishing  dinner.  It  was  almost  a  wed- 
ding-feast. The  bride  was  not  present,  but  toasts 
had  been  drunk  in  her  honour.  Suddenly  a  man 
appeared  at  the  gate  and  asked,  in  a  trembling  voice, 
to  speak  to  Maitre  Esteve  in  private.  Esteve  rose 
and  went  out  upon  the  highway. 

"  Master,"  said  the  man,  "  you  are  marrying  your 
son  to  a  slut  who  has  been  my  mistress  for  the  last 
two  years.  What  I  say  I  prove ;  here  are  letters. 
Her  parents  knew  all,  and  promised  her  to  me,  but 
since  your  son  has  courted  her  neither  she  nor  her 
parents  will  have  me.  But  I  think,  after  that,  she 
ought  not  to  be  the  wife  of  another." 

"Very  well,"  said  Maitre  Esteve,  after  he  had 
read  the  letters.  "  Come  in,  and  drink  a  glass  of 
muscat." 

The  man  replied  :  — 

"Thank  you!  no;  I  am  more  sorrowful  than 
thirsty."  And  he  went  away. 

The  father  returned,  impassible.  He  resumed 
his  place  at  the  table,  and  the  meal  ended  gayly. 

That  evening  Maitre  Esteve  and  his  son  went 
to  walk  in  the  fields.  They  were  out  a  long  time  ; 
when  they  returned  the  mother  awaited  them. 

"  Wife,"  said  the  farmer,  leading  his  son  to  her, 
"  Kiss  him ;  he  is  very  unhappy." 


38  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

Jan  never  spoke  again  of  his  Arlesian  girl.  But 
he  still  loved  her,  and  more  than  ever  after  she 
was  shown  to  him  in  the  arms  of  another.  Only, 
he  was  too  proud  to  speak  of  it ;  and  it  was  that 
which  killed  him,  poor  lad  !  Sometimes  he  would 
spend  whole  days  in  a  corner  without  moving. 
At  other  times  he  would  dig  with  fury  and  do  him- 
self, alone,  the  work  of  ten  labourers.  But  as  soon 
as  evening  came  he  took  the  road  to  Aries ;  walk- 
ing straight  before  him  till  he  saw  the  slender 
spires  of  the  town  rise  in  the  sunset  glow.  Then 
he  returned.  Never  did  he  go  any  farther. 

Seeing  him  thus,  always  sad  and  solitary,  the 
people  of  the  farmhouse  knew  not  what  to  do. 
They  feared  some  danger.  Once,  at  table,  his 
mother,  looking  at  him  with  eyes  full  of  tears, 
said :  — 

"  Listen,  Jan,  if  you  wish  for  her  all  the  same, 
we  will  give  her  to  you." 

The  father,  red  with  shame,  lowered  his  head. 

Jan  made  sign  of  refusal  and  went  away. 

From  that  day  forth  he  changed  his  way  of  liv- 
ing, affecting  to  be  gay  in  order  to  reassure  his 
parents.  He  was  seen  once  more  at  balls,  in  the 
wine-shops,  at  the  races.  At  the  election  in 
Fonvieille  it  was  he  who  led  the  farandole. 

The  father  said :  "  He  is  cured."  The  mother 
still  had  fears  and  watched  her  child  more  than 
ever.  Jan  slept  with  Cadet  close  to  the  silk-worm 
attic ;  the  poor  old  woman  had  her  bed  made  up 
beside  their  chamber,  —  the  silk-worms  might  need 
her,  she  said. 


The  Artesian  Girl.  39 

And  now  came  the  fete  of  Saint-filoi,  the  patron 
of  farmers. 

Great  joy  at  the  farmhouse.  There  was  chdteau- 
neuf  for  every  one,  and  boiled  wine  seemed  to  rain. 
Then,  fire-crackers  and  fire-barrels,  and  coloured 
lanterns  in  the  hazel  trees.  Vive  Saint-Eloi ! 
They  farandoled  to  death.  Cadet  burned  his  new 
blouse.  Jan  himself  seemed  happy;  he  insisted 
on  making  his  mother  dance,  and  the  poor  woman 
wept  with  joy. 

By  midnight  they  all  went  to  bed.  They 
needed  sleep.  Jan  did  not  sleep,  and  Cadet  said 
the  next  day  he  had  sobbed  all  night.  Ah  !  I  tell 
you  he  was  deeply  bitten,  that  lad. 

The  next  day,  at  dawn,  the  mother  heard  some  one 
cross  her  room  running.  She  had  a  presentiment. 

"Jan,  is  that  you?" 

Jan  did  not  answer ;  he  was  already  on  the  stair- 
way. 

Quick,  quick  the  mother  rose. 

"  Jan,  where  are  you  going?  " 

He  ran  to  the  hayloft ;  she  followed  him. 

"  My  son,  for  God's  sake !  " 

He  closed  the  door  and  bolted  it. 

"  Jan,  my  little  Jan !  answer !  What  are  you 
doing?" 

Her  old  hands,  trembling,  felt  for  the  latch. 
A  window  opened,  the  sound  of  a  fall  was  heard 
on  the  stones  of  the  courtyard,  and  that  was  all. 

He  had  said  to  himself,  poor  lad :  "  I  love  her 
too  much  —  I  must  go." 


40  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

Ah  !  miserable  hearts  that  we  have  !  And  yet, 
it  is  hard  that  contempt  is  unable  to  kill  love. 

That  morning  the  people  in  the  village  wondered 
who  it  was  that  cried  out  so  terribly  down  there, 
toward  the  Esteve  farm. 

In  the  courtyard,  before  the  stone  table,  all 
covered  with  dew  and  blood,  the  mother,  naked, 
sat  lamenting  with  her  dead  boy  in  her  arms. 


The  Popes  Mule.  41 


THE  POPE'S   MULE. 

OF  all  the  pretty  sayings,  proverbs,  adages,  with 
which  our  Provencal  peasantry  decorate  their  dis- 
course, I  know  of  none  more  picturesque,  or 
more  peculiar  than  this :  —  for  fifteen  leagues 
around  my  mill,  when  they  speak  of  a  spiteful  and 
vindictive  man,  they  say :  "  That  fellow !  distrust 
him !  he  's  like  the  Pope's  mule  who  kept  her  kick 
for  seven  years." 

I  tried  for  a  long  time  to  find  out  whence  that 
proverb  came,  what  that  Pope's  mule  was,  and  why 
she  kept  her  kick  for  seven  years.  No  one  could 
give  me  any  information  on  the  subject,  not  even 
Francet  Mamaf,  my  old  fife-player,  though  he 
knows  his  Provencal  legends  to  the  tips  of  his 
fingers.  Francet  thought,  as  I  did,  that  there 
must  be  some  ancient  chronicle  of  Avignon  behind 
it,  but  he  had  never  heard  of  it  otherwise  than  as 
a  proverb. 

"  You  won't  find  it  anywhere  except  in  the 
Grasshoppers'  Library,"  said  the  old  man,  laughing. 

The  idea  struck  me  as  a  good  one ;  and  as  the 
Grasshoppers'  Library  is  close  at  my  door,  I  shut 
myself  up  there  for  over  a  week. 

It  is  a  wonderful  library,  admirably  stocked, 
open  to  poets  night  and  day,  and  served  by  little 


42  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

librarians  with  cymbals  who  make  music  for  you 
all  the  time.  I  spent  some  delightful  days  there, 
and  after  a  week  of  researches  (on  my  back)  I 
ended  by  discovering  what  I  wanted,  namely: 
the  story  of  the  mule  and  that  famous  kick  which 
she  kept  for  seven  years.  The  tale  is  pretty, 
though  rather  na'fve,  and  I  shall  try  to  tell  it  to 
you  just  as  I  read  it  yesterday  in  a  manuscript 
coloured  by  the  weather,  smelling  of  good  dried 
lavender  and  tied  with  the  Virgin's  threads  —  as 
they  call  gossamer  in  these  parts. 

Whoso  did  not  see  Avignon  in  the  days  of  the 
Popes  has  seen  nothing.  For  gayety,  life,  anima- 
tion, the  excitement  of  festivals,  never  was  a  town 
like  it.  From  morning  till  night  there  was  nothing 
but  processions,  pilgrimages,  streets  strewn  with 
flowers,  draped  with  tapestries,  cardinals  arriving 
by  the  Rhone,  banners  in  the  breeze,  galleys 
dressed  in  flags,  the  Pope's  soldiers  chanting  Latin 
on  the  squares,  and  the  tinkling  rattle  of  the  beg- 
ging friars ;  while  from  garret  to  cellar  of  houses 
that  pressed,  humming,  round  the  great  papal 
palace  like  bees  around  their  hive,  came  the  tick- 
tack  of  lace-looms,  the  to-and-fro  of  shuttles  weav- 
ing the  gold  thread  of  chasubles,  the  tap-tap  of 
the  goldsmith's  chasing-tools  tapping  on  the  chal- 
ices, the  tuning  of  choir-instruments  at  the  lute- 
makers,  the  songs  of  the  spinners  at  their  work ; 
and  above  all  this  rose  the  sound  of  bells,  and 
always  the  echo  of  certain  tambourines  coming 
from  away  down  there  on  the  bridge  of  Avignon. 


The  Popes  Mule.  43 

Because,  with  us,  when  the  people  are  happy  they 
must  dance  —  they  must  dance ;  and  as  in  those 
days  the  streets  were  too  narrow  for  the  farandole, 
fifes  and  tambourines  posted  themselves  on  the 
bridge  of  Avignon  in  the  fresh  breeze  of  the 
Rhone,  and  day  and  night  folks  danced,  they 
danced.  Ah  !  the  happy  times  !  the  happy  town  ! 
Halberds  that  did  not  wound,  prisons  where  the 
wine  was  put  to  cool ;  no  hunger,  no  war.  That 's 
how  the  Popes  of  the  Comtat  governed  their 
people ;  and  that 's  why  their  people  so  deeply 
regretted  them. 

There  was  one  Pope  especially,  a  good  old  man 
called  Boniface.  Ah !  that  one,  many  were  the 
tears  shed  in  Avignon  when  he  was  dead.  He  was 
so  amiable,  so  affable  a  prince  !  He  laughed  so 
merrily  on  the  back  of  his  mule !  And  when  you 
passed  him,  were  you  only  a  poor  little  gatherer  of 
madder-roots,  or  the  grand  provost  of  the  town,  he 
gave  you  his  benediction  so  politely  !  A  real  Pope 
of  Yvetot,  but  a  Yvetot  of  Provence,  with  some- 
thing delicate  in  his  laugh,  a  sprig  of  sweet  marjoram 
in  his  cardinal's  cap,  and  never  a  Jeanneton,  —  the 
only  Jeanneton  he  was  ever  known  to  have,  that 
good  Father,  was  his  vineyard,  his  own  little  vine- 
yard which  he  planted  himself,  three  leagues  from 
Avignon,  among  the  myrtles  of  Chateau-Neuf. 

Every  Sunday,  after  vespers,  the  good  man  paid 
court  to  his  vineyard ;  and  when  he  was  up  there, 
sitting  in  the  blessed  sun,  his  mule  near  him,  his 
cardinals  stretched  out  beneath  the  grapevines, 


44  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

he  would  order  a  flask  of  the  wine  of  his 
own  growth  to  be  opened, — that  beautiful  wine, 
the  colour  of  rubies,  which  is  now  called  the 
ChaUau-Neuf  des  Papes,  and  he  sipped  it  with 
sips,  gazing  at  his  vineyard  tenderly.  Then,  the 
flask  empty,  the  day  fading,  he  rode  back  joyously 
to  town,  the  Chapter  following;  and  when  he 
crossed  the  bridge  of  Avignon  through  the 
tambourines  and  the  farandolesy  his  mule,  set 
going  by  the  music,  paced  along  in  a  skipping 
little  amble,  while  he  himself  beat  time  to  the 
dance  with  his  cap,  which  greatly  scandalized 
the  cardinals  but  made  the  people  say :  "  Ah ! 
the  good  prince  !  Ah  !  the  kind  Pope !  " 

What  the  Pope  loved  best  in  the  world,  next  to 
his  vineyard  of  Chateau-Neuf,  was  his  mule.  The 
good  man  doted  on  that  animal.  Every  evening 
before  he  went  to  bed  he  went  to  see  if  the  stable 
was  locked,  if  nothing  was  lacking  in  the  manger ; 
and  never  did  he  rise  from  table  without  seeing 
with  his  own  eyes  the  preparation  of  a  great  bowl 
of  wine  in  the  French  fashion  with  sugar  and  spice, 
which  he  took  to  his  mule  himself,  in  spite  of  the 
remarks  of  his  cardinals.  It  must  be  said  that  the 
animal  was  worth  the  trouble.  She  was  a  hand- 
some black  mule,  with  reddish  points,  sure-footed, 
hide  shining,  back  broad  and  full,  carrying  proudly 
her  thin  little  head  decked  out  with  pompons  and 
ribbons,  silver  bells  and  streamers;  gentle  as  an 
angel  withal,  innocent  eyes,  and  two  long  ears, 
always  shaking,  which  gave  her  the  look  of  a  down- 


The  Popes  Mule.  45 

right  good  fellow.  All  Avignon  respected  her, 
and  when  she  passed  through  the  streets  there 
were  no  civilities  that  the  people  did  not  pay  her ; 
for  every  one  knew  there  was  no  better  way  to 
stand  well  at  court,  and  that  the  Pope's  mule, 
for  all  her  innocent  look,  had  led  more  than  one 
man  to  fortune,  —  witness  Tistet  Ve"dene  and  his 
amazing  adventure. 

This  Tistet  Ve"dene  was,  in  point  of  fact,  an  im- 
pudent young  rogue,  whom  his  father,  Guy  Ve"dene, 
the  goldsmith,  had  been  forced  to  turn  out  of  his 
house,  because  he  would  not  work  and  only  de- 
bauched the  apprentices.  For  six  months  Tistet 
dragged  his  jacket  through  all  the  gutters  of 
Avignon,  but  principally  those  near  the  papal 
palace;  for  the  rascal  had  a  notion  in  his  head 
about  the  Pope's  mule,  and  you  shall  now  see 
what  mischief  was  in  it. 

One  day  when  his  Holiness  was  riding  all  alone 
beneath  the  ramparts,  behold  our  Tistet  approach- 
ing him  and  saying,  with  his  hands  clasped  in 
admiration :  — 

"  Ah  !  mon  Dieu,  Holy  Father,  what  a  fine  mule 
you  are  riding !  Just  let  me  look  at  her.  Ah ! 
Pope,  what  a  mule !  The  Emperor  of  Germany 
has  n't  her  equal." 

And  he  stroked  her  and  spoke  to  her  softly  as  if 
to  a  pretty  young  lady :  — 

"  Come  here,  my  treasure,  my  jewel,  my 
pearl—" 

And  the  good  Pope,  quite  touched,  said  to 
himself:  — 


46  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

"  What  a  nice  young  fellow ;  how  kind  he  is  to 
my  mule !  " 

And  the  next  day  what  do  you  think  happened  ? 
Tistet  Vedene  changed  his  yellow  jacket  for  a 
handsome  lace  alb,  a  purple  silk  hood,  shoes  with 
buckles  ;  and  he  entered  the  household  of  the  Pope, 
where  no  one  had  ever  yet  been  admitted  but  sons 
of  nobles  and  nephews  of  cardinals.  That 's  what 
intriguing  means !  But  Tistet  was  not  satisfied 
with  that. 

Once  in  the  Pope's  service,  the  rascal  continued 
the  game  he  had  played  so  successfully.  Insolent 
to  every  one,  he  showed  attentions  and  kindness 
to  none  but  the  mule,  and  he  was  always  to  be 
met  with  in  the  courtyards  of  the  palace  with  a 
handful  of  oats,  or  a  bunch  of  clover,  shaking  its 
pink  blooms  at  the  window  of  the  Holy  Father  as 
if  to  say:  "  Hein  !  who's  that  for,  hey?"  Time 
and  again  this  happened,  so  that,  at  last,  the  good 
Pope,  who  felt  himself  getting  old,  left  to  Tistet 
the  care  of  looking  after  the  stable  and  of  carrying 
to  the  mule  his  bowl  of  wine,  —  which  did  not 
cause  the  cardinals  to  laugh. 

Nor  the  mule  either.  For  now,  at  the  hour  her 
wine  was  due  she  beheld  half  a  dozen  little  pages 
of  the  household  slipping  hastily  into  the  hay  with 
their  hoods  and  their  laces ;  and  then,  soon  after, 
a  good  warm  smell  of  caramel  and  spices  pervaded 
the  stable,  and  Tistet  Ve"dene  appeared  bearing 
carefully  the  bowl  of  hot  wine.  Then  the  poor 
animal's  martyrdom  began. 


The  Popes  Mick.  47 

That  fragrant  wine  she  loved,  which  kept  her 
warm  and  gave  her  wings,  they  had  the  cruelty  to 
bring  it  into  her  stall  and  let  her  smell  of  it ;  then, 
when  her  nostrils  were  full  of  the  perfume,  away ! 
and  the  beautiful  rosy  liquor  went  down  the  throats 
of  those  young  scamps !  And  not  only  did  they 
steal  her  wine,  but  they  were  like  devils,  those 
young  fellows,  after  they  had  drunk  it.  One  pulled 
her  ears,  another  her  tail.  Quiquet  jumped  on  her 
back,  B61uguet  put  his  hat  on  her  head,  and  not 
one  of  the  rascals  ever  thought  that  with  one  good 
kick  of  her  hind-legs  the  worthy  animal  could  send 
them  all  to  the  polar  star,  and  farther  still  if  she 
chose.  But  no !  you  are  not  the  Pope's  mule  for 
nothing  —  that  mule  of  benedictions  and  plenary 
indulgences.  The  lads  might  do  what  they  liked, 
she  was  never  angry  with  them ;  it  was  only  Tistet 
Ve"dene  whom  she  hated.  He,  indeed  !  when  she 
felt  him  behind  her,  her  hoofs  itched ;  and  reason 
enough  too.  That  good-for-nothing  Tistet  played 
her  such  villanous  tricks.  He  had  such  cruel 
ideas  and  inventions  after  drinking. 

One  day  he  took  it  into  his  head  to  make  her 
go  with  him  into  the  belfry,  high  up,  very  high 
up,  to  the  peak  of  the  palace !  What  I  am  telling 
you  is  no  tale ;  two  hundred  thousand  Provencal 
men  and  women  saw  it.  Imagine  the  terror  of 
that  unfortunate  mule,  when,  after  turning  for  an 
hour,  blindly,  round  a  corkscrew  staircase  and 
climbing  I  don't  know  how  many  steps,  she  found 
herself  all  of  a  sudden  on  a  platform  blazing  with 
light,  while  a  thousand  feet  below  her  she  saw  a 


48  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

diminutive  Avignon,  the  booths  in  the  market  no 
bigger  than  nuts,  the  Pope's  soldiers  moving  about 
their  barrack  like  little  red  ants,  and  down  there, 
bright  as  a  silver  thread,  a  microscopic  little  bridge 
on  which  they  were  dancing,  dancing.  Ah  !  poor 
beast !  what  a  panic  !  At  the  cry  she  gave,  all  the 
windows  of  the  palace  shook. 

"What's  the  matter?  what  are  they  doing  to 
my  mule?"  cried  the  good  Pope,  rushing  out 
upon  his  balcony. 

Tistet  Vedene  was  already  in  the  courtyard  pre- 
tending to  weep  and  tear  his  hair. 

"  Ah !  great  Holy  Father,  what 's  the  matter, 
indeed !  Mon  Dieu !  what  will  become  of  us  ? 
There  's  your  mule  gone  up  to  the  belfry." 

"  All  alone?" 

"Yes,  great  Holy  Father,  all  alone.  Look  up 
there,  high  up.  Don't  you  see  the  tips  of  her  ears 
pointing  out  —  like  two  swallows?" 

"  Mercy  !  "  cried  the  poor  Pope,  raising  his  eyes. 
"  Why,  she  must  have  gone  mad  !  She  '11  kill  herself ! 
Come  down,  come  down,  you  luckless  thing !  " 

Pecaire  !  she  wanted  nothing  so  much  as  to  come 
down;  but  how?  which  way?  The  stairs?  not  to 
be  thought  of;  they  can  be  mounted,  those  things  ; 
but  as  for  going  down !  why,  they  are  enough  to 
break  one's  legs  a  hundred  times.  The  poor  mule 
was  in  despair,  and  while  circling  round  and  round 
the  platform  with  her  big  eyes  full  of  vertigo  she 
thought  of  Tistet  V6dene. 

"Ah!  bandit,  if  I  only  escape  —  what  a  kick 
to-morrow  morning !  " 


The  Popes  Mule.  49 

That  idea  of  a  kick  put  some  courage  into  her 
heart;  without  it  she  never  could  have  held  good. 
.  .  At  last,  they  managed  to  save  her ;  but 't  was 
quite  a  serious  affair.  They  had  to  get  her  down 
with  a  derrick,  ropes,  and  a  sling.  You  can  fancy 
what  humiliation  it  was  for  a  Pope's  mule  to  see 
herself  suspended  at  that  height,  her  four  hoofs 
swimming  in  the  void  like  a  cockchafer  hanging 
to  a  string.  And  all  Avignon  looking  at  her ! 

The  unfortunate  beast  could  not  sleep  at  night. 
She  fancied  she  was  still  turning  round  and  round 
that  cursed  platform  while  the  town  laughed  below, 
and  again  she  thought  of  the  infamous  Tistet  and 
the  fine  kick  of  her  heels  she  would  let  fly  at  him 
next  day.  Ah  !  friends,  what  a  kick  !  the  dust  of 
it  would  be  seen  as  far  as  Pampe'rigouste. 

Now,  while  this  notable  reception  was  being  made 
ready  for  him  in  the  Pope's  stable  what  do  you  think 
Tistet  Vedene  was  about?  He  was  descending 
the  Rhone  on  a  papal  galley,  singing  as  he  went 
his  way  to  the  Court  of  Naples  with  a  troop  of 
young  nobles  whom  the  town  of  Avignon  sent 
every  year  to  Queen  Jeanne  to  practise  diplomacy 
and  fine  manners.  Tistet  Ve"dene  was  not  noble ; 
but  the  Pope  was  bent  on  rewarding  him  for  the 
care  he  had  given  to  his  mule,  and  especially  for 
the  activity  he  displayed  in  saving  her  from  her 
perilous  situation. 

The  mule  was  the  disappointed  party  on  the 
morrow ! 

"  Ah !  the  bandit !  he  suspected  something,"  she 
thought,  shaking  her  silver  bells.  "  No  matter  for 


50  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

that,  scoundrel ;  you  '11  find  it  when  you  get  back, 
that  kick ;  I  '11  keep  it  for  you  !  " 

And  she  kept  it  for  him. 

After  Tistet's  departure  the  Pope's  mule  returned 
to  her  tranquil  way  of  life  and  her  usual  proceed- 
ings. No  more  Quiquet,  no  more  Beluguet  in 
the  stable.  The  good  old  days  of  the  spiced  wine 
came  back,  and  with  them  good-humour,  long 
siestas,  and  the  little  gavotte  step  as  she  crossed 
the  bridge  of  Avignon.  Nevertheless,  since  her  ad- 
venture a  certain  coldness  was  shown  to  her  in  the 
town.  Whisperings  were  heard  as  she  passed,  old 
people  shook  their  heads,  children  laughed  and 
pointed  to  the  belfry.  The  good  Pope  himself  no 
longer  had  quite  the  same  confidence  in  his  friend, 
and  when  he  let  himself  go  into  a  nice  little  nap 
on  her  back  of  a  Sunday,  returning  from  his  vine- 
yard, he  always  had  this  thought  latent  in  his 
mind:  "What  if  I  should  wake  up  there  on  the 
platform !  "  The  mule  felt  this,  and  she  suffered, 
but  said  nothing;  only,  whenever  the  name  of 
Tistet  Ve"dene  was  uttered  in  her  hearing,  her 
long  ears  quivered,  and  she  struck  the  iron  of  her 
shoes  hard  upon  the  pavement  with  a  little  snort. 

Seven  years  went  by.  Then,  at  the  end  of 
those  seven  years,  Tistet  Vedene  returned  from 
the  Court  of  Naples.  His  time  was  not  yet  fin- 
ished over  there,  but  he  had  heard  that  the  Pope's 
head  mustard-bearer  had  died  suddenly  at  Avignon, 
and  as  the  place  seemed  a  good  one,  he  hurried 
back  in  haste  to  solicit  it. 

When  this  intriguing   Vedene  entered  the  pal- 


The  Popes  Mule.  51 

ace  the  Holy  Father  did  not  recognize  him,  he 
had  grown  so  tall  and  so  stout.  It  must  also  be 
said  that  the  good  Pope  himself  had  grown  older, 
and  could  not  see  much  without  spectacles. 

Tistet  was  not  abashed. 

"  What,  great  Holy  Father !  you  don't  remem- 
ber me?  It  is  I,  Tistet  V6dene." 

"V6dene?" 

"  Why,  yes,  you  know  the  one  that  took  the 
wine  to  your  mule." 

"  Ah  !  yes,  yes,  —  I  remember.  A  good  little 
fellow,  that  Tistet  Vedene !  And  now,  what  do 
you  want  of  me  ?  " 

"  Oh  !  very  little,  great  Holy  Father.  I  came  to 
ask —  By  the  bye,  have  you  still  got  her,  that 
nule  of  yours  ?  Is  she  well  ?  Ah !  good !  I 
came  to  ask  you  for  the  place  of  the  chief  mustard- 
bearer  who  lately  died." 

"  Mustard-bearer,  you !  Why  you  are  too 
young.  How  old  are  you?  " 

"  Twenty-two,  illustrious  pontiff;  just  five  years 
older  than  your  mule.  Ah  !  palm  of  God,  what  a 
fine  beast  she  is !  If  you  only  knew  how  I  love 
her,  that  mule,  —  how  I  pined  for  her  in  Italy! 
Won't  you  let  me  see  her?" 

"Yes,  my  son,  you  shall  see  her,"  said  the 
worthy  Pope,  quite  touched.  "And  as  you  love 
her  so  much  I  must  have  you  live  near  her. 
Therefore,  from  this  day  I  attach  you  to  my  per- 
son as  chief  mustard-bearer.  My  cardinals  will 
cry  out,  but  no  matter  !  I  'm  used  to  that.  Come 
and  see  me  to-morrow,  after  vespers,  and  you 


52  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

shall  receive  the  insignia  of  your  rank  in  presence 
of  the  whole  Chapter,  and  then  I  will  show  you 
the  mule  and  you  shall  go  to  the  vineyard  with  us, 
hey !  hey !  " 

I  need  not  tell  you  if  Tistet  Vedene  was  con- 
tent when  he  left  the  palace,  and  with  what  impa- 
tience he  awaited  the  ceremony  of  the  morrow. 
And  yet  there  was  one  more  impatient  and  more 
content  than  he  :  it  was  the  mule.  After  Vedene's 
return,  until  vespers  on  the  following  day  that  ter- 
rible animal  never  ceased  to  stuff  herself  with  oats, 
and  practise  her  heels  on  the  wall  behind  her. 
She,  too,  was  preparing  for  the  ceremony. 

Well,  on  the  morrow,  when  vespers  were  said, 
Tistet  Ve"dene  made  his  entry  into  the  papal  court- 
yard. All  the  grand  clergy  were  there ;  the  cardi- 
nals in  their  red  robes,  the  devil's  advocate  in  black 
velvet,  the  convent  abbots  in  their  small  mitres, 
the  wardens  of  Saint-Agrico,  the  violet  hoods  of 
the  Pope's  household,  the  lower  clergy  also,  the 
Pope's  guard  in  full  uniform,  the  three  penitential 
brotherhoods,  the  hermits  of  Mont-Ventoux,  with 
their  sullen  faces,  and  the  little  clerk  who  walks 
behind  them  with  a  bell,  the  flagellating  friars 
naked  to  the  waist,  the  ruddy  sextons  in  judge's 
gowns,  all,  all,  down  to  the  givers  of  holy  water, 
and  the  man  who  lights  and  him  who  puts  out  the 
candles  — not  one  was  missing.  Ah  !  'twas  a  fine 
ordination  !  Bells,  fire-crackers,  sunshine,  music, 
and  always  those  frantic  tambourines  leading  the 
farandole  over  there,  on  the  bridge. 

When   Ve"dene    appeared  in  the    midst  of  this 


The  Popes  Mule.  53 

great  assembly,  his  fine  bearing  and  handsome 
face  sent  a  murmur  of  admiration  through  the 
crowd.  He  was  truly  a  magnificent  Provencal; 
but  of  the  blond  type,  with  thick  hair  curling  at 
the  tips,  and  a  dainty  little  beard,  that  looked  like 
slivers  of  fine  metal  fallen  from  the  chisel  of  his 
father,  the  goldsmith.  The  rumour  ran  that  the 
fingers  of  Queen  Jeanne  had  sometimes  played  in 
the  curls  of  that  golden  beard ;  and,  in  truth,  the 
Sieur  de  Vedene  had  the  self-glorifying  air  and  the 
abstracted  look  of  men  that  queens  have  loved. 
On  this  day,  in  order  to  do  honour  to  his  native 
town,  he  had  substituted  for  his  Neapolitan  clothes 
a  tunic  edged  with  pink,  a  la  Proven$ale,  and 
in  his  hood  there  quivered  a  tall  feather  of  the 
Camargue  ibis. 

As  soon  as  he  entered  the  new  official  bowed 
with  a  gallant  air,  and  approached  the  high  portico 
where  the  Pope  was  waiting  to  give  him  the  insig- 
nias  of  his  rank,  namely,  a  wooden  spoon  and  a 
saffron  coat.  The  mule  was  at  the  foot  of  the 
steps,  saddled  and  bridled,  all  ready  to  go  to  the 
vineyard ;  as  he  passed  beside  her,  Tistet  Vedene 
smiled  pleasantly,  and  stopped  to  give  her  a  friendly 
pat  or  two  on  the  back,  glancing,  as  he  did  so,  out 
of  the  corner  of  his  eye  to  see  if  the  Pope  noticed 
it.  The  position  was  just  right,  —  the  mule  let  fly 
her  heels. 

"  There,  take  it,  villain !  Seven  years  have  I 
kept  it  for  thee !  " 

And  she  gave  him  so  terrible  a  kick,  —  so  ter- 
rible that  even  at  Pamperigouste  the  smoke  was 


54  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

seen,  a  whirlwind  of  blond  dust,  in  which  flew  the 
feather  of  an  ibis,  and  that  was  all  that  remained  of 
the  unfortunate  Tistet  Vedene  ! 

Mule  kicks  are  not  usually  so  destructive ;  but 
this  was  a  papal  mule ;  and  then,  just  think !  she 
had  kept  it  for  him.  for  seven  years.  There  is  no 
finer  example  of  ecclesiastical  rancour. 


The  Lighthouse.  55 


THE   LIGHTHOUSE. 

THAT  night  I  could  not  sleep.  The  mistral  was 
angry,  and  the  roar  of  its  great  voice  kept  me 
awake  till  morning.  The  mill  cracked,  heavily 
swaying  its  mutilated  wings,  which  whistled  to  the 
north  wind  like  the  shrouds  of  a  ship.  Tiles  flew 
off  the  roof,  and,  afar,  the  serried  pines  with  which 
the  hill  is  covered  waved  and  rustled  in  the  shad- 
ows. I  might  have  thought  myself  on  the  open 
sea.  .  . 

All  this  reminded  me  of  my  beautiful  insomnias 
three  years  ago,  when  I  lived  in  the  phare  des  San- 
guinaircs  [lighthouse  of  the  Sanguinaires],  down 
there,  off  the  Corsican  coast,  at  the  entrance  of  the 
gulf  of  Ajaccio,  —  one  more  pretty  corner  that  I 
have  found  in  which  to  dream  and  live  alone. 

Imagine  a  ruddy  isle,  savage  of  aspect;  the 
lighthouse  on  one  point,  on  the  other  an  old  Geno- 
ese tower,  where,  in  my  day,  lived  an  eagle. 
Below,  on  the  shore,  was  a  ruined  lazaretto,  over- 
grown with  herbage ;  and  everywhere  ravines, 
clusters  of  great  rocks,  a  few  wild  goats,  the  little 
Corsican  horses  galloping  about,  their  manes 
streaming  in  the  wind ;  and  above,  far  above,  in  a 
whirl  of  sea-birds,  the  house  of  the  beacon,  with  its 


56  Letters  from  My ''  Mill. 

platform  of  white  masonry  where  the  keepers 
walk  up  and  down,  its  green  arched  doorway,  and 
its  cast-iron  tower,  at  the  top  of  which  the  great 
lantern  with  facets  shines  in  the  sun,  giving  light 
by  day  as  well  as  by  night.  .  .  That  is  the  lie 
des  Sanguinaires,  as  I  saw  it  again  this  wakeful 
night,  while  I  listened  to  the  snoring  of  my  pines. 
It  was  in  that  enchanted  isle  that  I  shut  myself  up 
at  times,  before  I  came  to  my  mill,  when  I  needed 
the  free  air  and  solitude. 
J7  What  did  I  do  there? 

Just  what  I  do  here,  only  less.  When  the  mistral 
or  the  tramontana  did  not  blow  too  hard,  I  lay  be- 
tween two  rocks  at  the  sea-level,  amid  the  gulls 
and  the  petrels  and  the  swallows,  and  there  I 
stayed  nearly  all  day  long  in  that  species  of  stupor 
and  delightful  dejection  which  comes  with  the  con- 

•i *»- i. •>    ^  £* 

templation  of  the  sea.  Ufou  know,  don't  you, 
that  lovely  intoxication  of  the  soul?)  We  do  not 
think,  we  do  not  dream.  All  our  being  escapes 
us,  flits  away,  is  scattered.  We  are  the  gull  that 
dives,  the  dust  of  foam  that  floats  in  the  sunlight 
between  two  waves,  the  vapour  of  that  steamer 
over  there  in  the  distance,  that  pretty  little  coral- 
boat  with  its  ruddy  sail,  that  pearl  of  the  water, 
that  flake  of  mist,  —  all,  we  are  all,  except  ourself. 
Oh !  what  precious  hours  of  semi-slumber  and 
self-dispersion  have  I  spent  upon  my  island ! 

On  the  strong  windy  days  when  the  shore  was 
not  tenable,  I  shut  myself  up  in  the  quarantine 
courtyard,  a  melancholy  little  courtyard,  fragrant 
with  rosemary  and  wild  absinthe;  and  there, 


The  Lighthouse.  57 

crouching  in  a  projection  of  the  old  wall,  I  let 
myself  be  softly  invaded  by  the  vague  essence  of 
loneliness  and  sadness  which  floated  with  the  sun- 
shine into  those  stone  cells,  open  at  one  end  like 
ancient  tombs.  From  time  to  time  a  gate  would 
clap,  a  light  spring  bound  upon  the  grass ;  't  was 
a  goat  coming  in  to  browse  under  shelter  from  the 
wind.  When  she  saw  me  she  stopped  abashed, 
and  stood  still,  horns  erect,  air  alert,  looking  at 
me  with  an  infantine  eye. 

Toward  five  o'clock  the  trumpet  of  the  keepers 
called  me  to  dinner.  Then  I  took  a  little  path 
through  the  tangle  of  rock  overhanging  the  sea, 
and  went  slowly  up  to  the  lighthouse,  turning  at 
every  step  to  that  vast  horizon  of  water  and  light 
which  seemed  to  enlarge  the  higher  I  went. 

Above,  it  was  charming.  I  still  see  that  beauti- 
ful dining-room  with  broad  tiles  and  oak  panels, 
the  bouillabaisse  smoking  in  the  middle  of  it,  the 
door  wide  open  to  the  white  terrace,  and  the  whole 
setting  sun  pouring  in.  The  keepers  were  there, 
waiting  until  I  came  to  sit  down  to  table.  There 
were  three  of  them,  a  Marseillais  and  two  Corsicans ; 
all  were  small  men,  bearded,  their  faces  tanned, 
fissured;  wearing  the  same  pelone — short,  hooded 
cloak  of  goatskin  —  but  each  man  had  a  gait  and 
a  temperament  unlike  the  others. 

By  the  way  these  men  moved,  one  could  in- 
stantly feel  the  difference  between  the  two  races. 
The  Marseillais,  industrious  and  lively,  always 
busy,  always  in  motion,  roved  the  isle  from  morn- 


58  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

ing  till  night,  gardening,  fishing,  gathering  the 
gulls'  eggs,  hiding  in  the  rocks  to  catch  a  goat  and 
milk  her,  and  always  with  some  aioli  or  bouilla- 
baisse a-cooking. 

The  Corsicans,  on  the  other  hand,  beyond  their 
regular  service,  did  absolutely  nothing.  They 
considered  themselves  functionaries,  and  passed 
their  days  in  the  kitchen  playing  interminable 
games  of  scopa>  never  interrupting  them  except  to 
relight  their  pipes  with  a  grave  air,  and  to  cut  up 
into  the  hollow  of  their  hands,  with  scissors,  the  big 
green  tobacco-leaves. 

In  other  respects,  Marseillais  and  Corsicans, 
they  were  all  three  good  fellows,  simple,  artless, 
full  of  attentions  for  their  guest,  though  in  their 
hearts  they  must  have  thought  him  a  very  ex- 
traordinary gentleman. 

Just  think !  to  come  and  shut  himself  up  in  a 
lighthouse  for  pleasure !  They,  who  found  the 
days  so  long,  and  felt  so  happy  when  their  turn 
came  to  go  ashore.  In  the  summer  season  this 
great  happiness  was  allowed  them  once  a  month. 
Ten  days  ashore  for  thirty  days  of  lighthouse ; 
that  is  the  rule ;  but  in  winter  and  bad  weather  no 
rule  holds  good.  The  wind  blows,  the  waves  rise, 
the  Sanguinaires  are  white  with  foam,  and  the 
keepers  on  duty  are  kept  confined  for  two  or  three 
months  together,  and  sometimes  under  terrible 
conditions. 

"  Here 's  what  happened  to  me,  monsieur,"  said 
old  Bartoli  one  day  as  we  were  dining.  "  Here  's 
what  happened  to  me  five  years  ago  of  a  winter's 


The  Lighthouse.  59 

evening,  at  this  very  table  where  we  are  now.  That 
night  there  were  only  two  of  us  in  the  lighthouse, 
I  and  a  comrade  called  Tcheco.  The  others  were 
ashore,  ill,  or  on  their  holiday,  I  forget  which. 
We  were  finishing  dinner,  very  quietly,  when,  all 
of  a  sudden,  my  comrade  stopped  eating,  looked 
at  me  for  a  moment  with  such  queer  eyes,  and, 
poof!  he  fell  upon  the  table  his  arms  stretched 
out.  I  ran  to  him,  shook  him,  called  him :  — 

"<  OTche!  OTche!' 

"  Not  a  word  !  he  was  dead.  You  can  think  what 
emotion.  I  stood  more  than  an  hour  stupid  and 
trembling  before  that  corpse,  then  suddenly  the 
thought  came  to  me  —  the  beacon !  I  had  only 
time  to  climb  to  the  lantern  and  light  it  before 
night  fell.  And  what  a  night,  monsieur !  The 
sea,  the  wind  did  not  have  their  natural  voices. 
Every  second  it  seemed  to  me  that  some  one  called 
me  from  below.  And  such  fever !  such  thirst ! 
But  you  could  n't  have  made  me  go  down  —  I  was 
so  frightened  of  death.  However,  by  dawn,  a 
little  courage  came  back  to  me.  I  carried  my 
comrade  to  his  bed ;  a  sheet  above  him,  a  bit  of 
a  prayer,  and  then,  quick  !  the  danger  signal. 

"  Unfortunately,  the  sea  ran  high ;  in  vain  I  called, 
called ;  no  one  came.  And  there  I  was,  alone  in 
the  lighthouse  with  my  poor  Tcheco  for  God  knows 
how  long.  I  hoped  to  be  able  to  keep  him  near  me 
till  the  arrival  of  the  boat;  but  after  three  days 
that  was  impossible.  What  should  I  do?  Carry 
him  outside?  Bury  him?  The  rock  was  too  hard, 
and  there  are  so  many  crows  on  the  island.  It 


60  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

would  have  been  a  shame  to  abandon  that  Chris- 
tian to  their  maws.  Then  I  bethought  me  of  tak- 
ing him  down  to  one  of  those  cells  of  the  lazaretto. 
It  took  me  a  whole  afternoon  to  make  that  sad 
procession,  and,  I  tell  you,  it  needed  courage,  too. 
Do  you  know,  monsieur,  that  even  now  when  I  go 
down  on  that  side  of  the  island  in  a  high  wind  I 
fancy  that  I  still  have  that  corpse  on  my  shoulders." 
Poor  old  Bartoli !  the  perspiration  stood  out  on 
his  forehead  for  merely  thinking  of  it. 

Our  meals  were  passed  in  chatting  thus:  the 
beacon,  the  sea,  with  tales  of  shipwreck  and  of 
Corsican  pirates.  Then  as  daylight  faded,  the 
keeper  of  the  first  watch  lighted  his  lamp,  took 
his  pipe,  his  flask,  a  little  red-edged  Plutarch  (the 
entire  library  of  the  Sanguinaires)  and  disappeared 
in  the  darkness.  In  a  minute  we  heard  in  the 
depths  below  a  rattle  of  chains  and  pulleys,  and  the 
heavy  weights  of  a  clock  that  was  being  wound  up. 

As  for  me  during  this  time,  I  sat  outside  on  the 
terrace.  The  sun,  now  very  low,  was  descending 
quickly  into  the  water,  carrying  the  horizon  with 
it.  The  wind  freshened,  the  island  became  violet. 
In  the  sky,  a  big  bird  passed  heavily  quite  near 
me ;  it  was  the  eagle  of  the  tower  coming  home. 
Little  by  little  the  sea-mist  rose.  Soon  I  could 
see  only  the  white  fringe  round  the  isle.  Sud- 
denly, above  my  head,  a  soft  flood  of  light  gushed 
out.  'Twas  the  beacon.  Leaving  the  rest  of  the 
island  in  shadow,  the  clear  broad  ray  fell  full  upon 
the  water,  and  (I  was  los)  in  darkness  below  that 


The  Lighthouse.  61 

luminous  great  flood,  which  scarcely  spattered  me 
in  passing.  .  .  But  the  wind  is  freshening  still.  I 
must  go  in.  Feeling  my  wayfljmter)  and  close  the 
great  door.  I  put  up  the  iron  bars ;  then,  still  feel- 
ing before  me,  I  go  up  the  cast-iron  stairway,  which 
trembles  and  sounds  beneath  my  feet;  and  thus  I 
reach  the  summit  of  the  lighthouse.  Here  indeed 
is  brilliancy. 

Imagine  a  gigantic  Carcel  lamp  with  six  rows 
of  wicks,  around  which  slowly  revolve  the  sides  of 
the  lantern ;  some  are  filled  with  an  enormous  lens 
of  crystal,  others  open  on  a  stationary  sash  of  glass 
which  shelters  the  flame  from  the  breeze.  On 
entering,  I  was  dazzled.  The  brasses,  pewters, 
tin  reflectors,  the  walls  of  convex  crystal  turning 
with  those  great  bluish  circles,  all  this  glitter  and 
clash  of  lights  gave  me  a  moment  of  giddiness. 

Little  by  little,  however,  my  eyes  grew  accus- 
tomed to  the  glare,  and  I  seated  myself  at  the  foot 
of  the  lamp  beside  the  keeper,  who  was  reading  his 
Plutarch  aloud  to  keep  himself  from  going  to  sleep. 

Without,  darkness,  the  abyss.  On  the  little 
balcony  which  runs  round  the  lantern  the  wind  is 
rushing  like  a  madman,  howling.  The  lighthouse 
cracks,  the  sea  roars.  At  the  point  of  the  isle,  on 
the  reefs,  the  waves  make  a  noise  like  cannon. 
Invisible  fingers  rap  now  and  then  on  the  glass  — 
some  night-bird,  allured  by  the  light,  which  beats 
out  its  brains  on  the  crystal.  Within  the  warm 
and  sparkling  lantern  nothing  is  heard  but  the 
crackling  of  the  flame,  the  sound  of  the  oil  drop- 
ping, of  the  chain  winding,  and  the  monotonous 


62  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

voice  of  the  reader  intoning  the  life  of  Demetrius 
of  Phalaris. 

At  midnight  the  keeper  rises,  casts  a  final  look 
at  his  wicks,  and  we  both  go  down.  On  the  stair- 
way we  meet  the  comrade  of  the  second  watch, 
who  is  coming  up,  rubbing  his  eyes.  We  pass  him 
the  flask  and  the  Plutarch.  Then  before  we  seek 
our  beds  we  go  for  a  moment  to  the  lower  chamber, 
encumbered  with  chains,  heavy  weights,  reserves 
of  tin,  of  cordage,  and  there,  by  the  gleam  of  his 
little  lamp  the  keeper  writes  in  the  big  book  of  the 
beacon,  the  log,  always  open:  — 

"  Midnight.  Heavy  sea.  Tempest.  Ship  in 
the  offing." 


The  Wreck  of  the  "  SemiUante?       63 


THE  WRECK  OF  THE  «  SEMILLANTE." 

As  the  mistral  of  the  other  night  cast  us  on  the 
Corsican  coast  let  me  tell  you  a  terrible  tale  of  the 
sea  which  the  fishermen  over  there  often  relate  in 
their  night  watches,  and  about  which  chance  sup- 
plied me  with  very  curious  information. 

It  was  two  or  three  years  ago  that  I  was  roving 
the  Sea  of  Sardinia  with  six  or  seven  custom-house 
sailors.  A  rough  trip  for  a  novice.  Through- 
out the  month  of  March  we  had  but  one  fine  day. 
The  east  wind  pursued  us  and  the  sea  never  ceased 
to  rage. 

One  night  that  we  were  running  before  the  gale, 
our  boat  took  shelter  among  a  crowd  of  little  islands 
at  the  entrance  to  the  Straits  of  Bonifacio.  The 
aspect  of  those  islands  was  not  engaging:  great 
barren  rocks  covered  with  birds,  a  few  tufts  of  ab- 
sinthe, thickets  of  mastic-trees,  and  here  and  there 
in  the  swamps  logs  of  wood  in  process  of  rotting. 
But  for  passing  the  night,  i'  faith  those  dangerous- 
looking  rocks  seemed  safer  than  the  cabin  of  a 
half-decked  old  boat  where  the  sea  entered  as  if  it 
were  at  home ;  and  so  we  were  quite  contented  to 
go  ashore. 

We  had  barely  landed  and  the  sailors  were  light- 
ing a  fire  to  cook  the  bouillabaisse,  when  the  skip- 


64  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

per  called  me,  and,  said  pointing  to  a  little  inclosure 
of  white  masonry  almost  hidden  in  the  fog  at  the 
end  of  the  island  :  — 

"  Will  you  come  to  the  cemetery?  " 

"  Cemetery,  Captain  Lionetti !  Where  are  we, 
then?" 

"  At  the  Lavezzi  Islands,  monsieur.  This  is 
where  the  six  hundred  men  of  the  '  Se"millante ' 
are  buried,  exactly  where  their  frigate  was  wrecked 
just  ten  years  ago.  Poor  fellows  !  they  don't  have 
many  visitors,  and  the  least  we  can  do  is  to  say 
good-day  to  them,  now  we  are  here." 

"  With  all  my  heart,  captain." 

How  sad  it  was",  that  cemetery  of  the  "  S6mil- 
lante !  "  I  see  it  still  with  its  little  low  wall,  its 
rusty  iron  door,  hard  to  open,  its  silent  chapel,  and 
its  hundreds  of  black  crosses  half-hidden  by  the 
grass.  Not  a  crown  of  immortelles,  not  a  sou- 
venir !  nothing.  Ah !  the  poor  abandoned  dead, 
how  cold  they  must  be  in  those  chance  graves. 

We  remained  a  few  moments  on  our  knees. 
The  skipper  prayed  aloud.  Enormous  gulls,  sole 
guardians  of  the  cemetery,  circled  above  our 
heads,  mingling  their  hoarse  cries  with  the  lamen- 
tations of  the  ocean. 

The  prayer  ended,  we  returned  sadly  to  the  end 
of  the  island,  where  our  boat  was  moored.  Dur- 
ing our  absence  the  sailors  had  not  lost  their  time. 
We  found  a  great  fire  flaming  in  the  shelter  of  a 
rock,  and  a  smoking  sauce-pan.  Every  one  sat 
down  in  a  circle,  his  feet  to  the  flame,  and  each 


The   Wreck  of  the  "  Semillante."       65 

received  in  a  red  earthen  bowl  two  slices  of  black 
bread  thoroughly  steeped.  The  meal  was  silent; 
we  were  wet,  we  were  hungry,  and  then,  the 
neighbourhood  of  the  cemetery!  .  .  However, 
when  the  bowls  were  empty  we  lighted  our  pipes, 
and  talk  began.  Naturally  we  spoke  of  the 
"  Sdmillante." 

"But  how  did  it  happen?"  I  asked  the  skipper, 
who  was  gazing  at  the  flames  with  a  pensive  air, 
his  head  in  his  hands. 

"  How  did  it  happen?  "  replied  the  good  Lion- 
etti  with  a  heavy  sigh.  "  Alas  !  monsieur,  no  one 
in  the  world  can  tell  you  that.  All  we  know 
is  that  the  '  Semillante/  carrying  troops  to  the 
Crimea,  sailed  from  Toulon  one  evening  in  bad 
weather.  It  grew  worse  at  night.  Wind,  rain,  and 
a  sea  the  like  of  which  was  never  seen.  Towards 
morning  the  wind  fell  a  little  but  the  sea  was  wild, 
and  with  it  a  devilish  cursed  fog  in  which  you 
could  n't  see  a  light  at  four  steps  off.  Those  fogs, 
monsieur,  you  have  no  idea  how  treacherous  they 
are.  But  for  all  that,  my  idea  of  the  '  Semillante ' 
is  that  she  lost  her  rudder  that  morning,  for  there 's 
no  fog  that  holds  on  without  lifting  a  little,  and 
that  captain  of  hers  would  have  seen  enough  not 
to  lay  himself  out  on  these  rocks.  He  was  an  old 
salt  and  we  all  knew  him.  He  had  commanded 
the  Corsica  Station  for  three  years  and  knew  the 
coast  as  well  as  I  who  know  nothing  else." 

"What  time  of  day  is  it  thought  that  the 
'  S6millante '  perished?" 

"  It  must  have  been  midday ;  yes,  monsieur,  just 
5 


66  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

midday.  But  goodness  !  with  that  sea-fog  midday 
was  no  better  than  midnight.  A  custom-house 
man  ashore  told  me  that  about  half-past  eleven  on 
that  day,  coming  out  of  his  hut  to  fasten  the  shut- 
ters, his  cap  was  carried  off  by  the  wind,  and  at  the 
risk  of  being  blown  himself  into  the  sea  he  scram- 
bled after  it  along  the  shore  on  his  hands  and  knees. 
You  understand !  custom-house  folks  are  not  rich, 
and  caps  cost  dear.  It  seems  that  once  when  he 
raised  his  head  he  saw,  quite  close  to  him  in  the 
fog,  a  big  ship  under  bare  pofes  running  before  the 
wind  toward  the  Lavezzi  Islands.  She  went  so 
fast,  so  fast  that  the  man  had  scarcely  time  to 
see  her.  But  every  one  believes  she  was  the 
'  Se"millante,'  for  half  an  hour  later  a  shepherd 
found  her  lying  on  these  rocks.  And  here  he  is, 
monsieur,  that  shepherd,  just  as  I  am  speaking 
of  him,  and  he  will  tell  you  the  thing  himself. 
Good-day,  Palombo !  come  and  warm  yourself  a 
bit;  don't  be  afraid." 

A  man  in  a  hooded  mantle  whom  I  had  noticed 
for  the  last  few  minutes  hovering  around  our  fire, 
and  whom  I  thought  to  be  one  of  the  crew,  being 
ignorant  that  a  shepherd  was  on  the  island,  now 
came  forward  timidly. 

He  was  a  leprous  old  fellow,  three-quarters 
idiotic,  the  victim  of  some  scorbutic  disease  which 
gave  him  thick  swollen  lips  very  horrible  to  see. 
The  skipper  made  him  understand  with  difficulty 
what  we  wanted  of  him,  and  then,  raising  with  one 
finger  his  diseased  lip,  the  old  man  related  how  on 
the  day  in  question,  being  in  his  hut  about  midday, 


The   Wreck  of  the  "  Semillante."       67 

he  heard  an  awful  crash  upon  the  rocks.  As  the 
island  was  covered  with  water  he  could  not  leave 
the  hut,  and  it  was  not  until  the  next  day  that,  on 
opening  his  door,  he  saw  the  shore  piled  up  with 
wreckage  and  with  corpses  washed  in  by  the  sea. 
Horrified,  he  ran  to  his  boat  and  went  to  Boni- 
facio in  search  of  help. 

Tired  with  having  talked  so  much  the  shepherd 
sat  down,  and  the  skipper  resumed  the  tale:  — 

"  Yes,  monsieur,  that  poor  old  fellow  came  to 
warn  us.  He  was  almost  crazy  with  terror,  and 
ever  since  then  his  brain  has  been  off  the  track 
—  and  good  reason,  too.  Imagine  six  hundred 
bodies  in  a  heap  on  that  beach,  pell-mell  with 
splintered  woodwork  and  rags  of  sail.  Poor 
'  Semillante ' !  the  sea  had  crushed  her  at  one 
blow  and  torn  her  to  such  fragments  that  Palombo 
could  scarcely  find  enough  to  build  him  a  fence 
around  his  hut.  As  for  the  bodies,  they  were 
nearly  all  disfigured  and  horribly  mutilated;  it 
was  piteous  to  see  them  grappling  to  one  another. 
We  found  the  captain  in  full  uniform,  and  the 
chaplain  with  his  stole  round  his  neck ;  in  a  corner 
between  two  rocks,  was  a  little  cabin-boy  with  his 
eyes  wide  open ;  you  might  have  thought  he  was 
alive,  but  no !  It  was  written  above  that  no  one 
should  escape  —  " 

Here  the  skipper  interrupted  himself. 

"  Attention,  Nardi !  "  he  cried ;  "  the  fire  is  go- 
ing out." 

Nardi    thereupon   threw   two   or    three    tarred 


68  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

planks  upon  the  embers,  which  flamed  up  brightly, 
and  Lionetti  continued  :  — 

"  The  saddest  part  of  the  whole  story  is  this : 
Three  weeks  before  the  disaster  a  little  corvette, 
on  her  way,  like  the  '  Semillante,'  to  the  Crimea, 
was  wrecked  in  the  same  way  and  almost  at  the 
same  spot ;  only,  that  time  we  succeeded  in  saving 
the  crew  and  twenty  artillery  men  who  were 
aboard.  We  took  them  to  Bonifacio  and  kept 
them  two  days.  But  once  dry  and  afoot,  good- 
night and  good-luck !  the  artillery  men  returned 
to  Toulon,  where,  soon  after,  they  were  again  em- 
barked for  the  Crimea  —  guess  on  what  ship? 
On  the  '  Semillante  '  monsieur  !  We  found  them 
all,  the  whole  twenty,  lying  among  the  dead  just 
about  where  we  now  are.  I  myself  picked  up 
a  pretty  little  corporal  with  a  delicate  moustache, 
a  Paris  dandy,  whom  I  had  had  in  my  own  house 
and  who  had  kept  us  laughing  the  whole  time  with 
his  tales.  To  see  him  lying  here,  dead,  almost 
broke  my  heart.  Ah  !  Santa  Madre  !  " 

Thereupon  the  worthy  Lionetti,  shaking  the 
ashes  from  his  pipe  and  rolling  himself  up  in  his 
hooded  cloak  wished  me  good-night.  For  some 
time  longer  the  sailors  talked  together  in  low 
tones.  Then,  one  after  another,  the  pipes  went 
out.  No  one  spoke.  The  old  shepherd  went 
away.  And  I  was  left  alone  to  dream  in  the  midst 
of  the  sleeping  crew. 

Under  the  impression  of  the  lugubrious  tale  I 
have  just  heard,  I  try  to  reconstruct  in  thought 


The   Wreck  of  the  "  Semillante."       69 

the  poor  lost  frigate  and  the  story  of  the  death- 
throes  that  the  gulls  alone  had  witnessed.  Certain 
details  which  have  struck  my  mind  —  the  captain 
in  full  uniform,  the  chaplain's  stole,  the  twenty 
artillery  men  —  help  me  to  divine  the  various  vicis- 
situdes of  the  drama.  .  .  I  see  the  frigate  leaving 
Toulon  at  dusk  .  .  .  she  comes  out  into  the  offing. 
The  sea  is  rough,  the  wind  terrible;  but  the 
captain  is  a  valiant  sailor,  and  every  one  aboard 
is  confident.  .  . 

In  the  morning  the  sea-fog  rises.  Uneasiness  is 
felt.  The  crew  are  aloft.  The  captain  does  not 
quit  the  bridge.  Below,  where  the  soldiers  are 
shut  up,  it  is  dark ;  the  atmosphere  is  hot.  Some 
are  ill,  lying  with  their  heads  upon  their  knap- 
sacks. The  ship  rolls  horribly;  impossible  to 
keep  their  feet.  They  talk  as  they  sit,  in  groups 
on  the  floor,  and  clinging  to  the  benches ;  they 
shout  in  order  to  be  heard.  A  few  are  begin- 
ning to  feel  afraid.  Shipwrecks  are  so  frequent 
in  these  latitudes;  the  artillery  men  are  there 
to  say  so,  and  what  they  tell  is  not  reassuring. 
Their  corporal  especially,  a  Parisian,  always  jest- 
ing, though  he  makes  your  flesh  creep  with  his 
jokes. 

"Shipwreck?  why,  it  is  very  amusing,  a  ship- 
wreck. We  shall  get  off  with  an  icy  bath,  and 
they  '11  take  us  to  Bonifacio ;  capital  eating  at  old 
Lionetti's." 

And  his  comrades  laugh. 

Suddenly,  a  crash.  What's  that?  What  has 
happened? 


70  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

"The  rudder  has  gone,"  says  a  dripping  sailor, 
crossing  between  decks  at  a  run. 

"  Bon  voyage  !  "  cries  that  incorrigible  corporal, 
but  no  one  laughs  with  him  now. 

Great  tumult  on  deck.  The  fog  obstructs  all 
view.  The  sailors  go  and  come,  frightened,  and 
feeling  their  way.  .  .  No  rudder !  Impossible 
to  work  the  ship !  The  "  Semillante,"  drifting, 
goes  with  the  wind.  It  is  then  that  the  custom- 
house sailor  sees  her  pass;  it  is  half-past  eleven 
o'clock.  Ahead  of  the  frigate  something  sounds 
like  the  roar  of  cannon.  .  .  Breakers  !  breakers  ! 
'T  is  over,  all  hope  is  gone,  they  are  driving  ashore. 
The  captain  goes  down  into  his  cabin.  The  next 
moment  he  returns  to  his  place  on  the  bridge, 
wearing  his  full  uniform.  He  will  meet  death  with 
dignity. 

Between  decks  the  soldiers  look  at  one  another 
anxiously,  but  say  nothing.  The  sick  ones  try  to 
rise;  the  corporal  laughs  no  longer.  It  is  then 
that  the  door  opens  and  the  chaplain  in  his  stole 
appears  upon  the  threshold. 

"  Kneel  down,  my  sons." 

They  all  obey.  In  a  ringing  voice  the  priest 
reads  the  prayer  for  the  dying. 

Suddenly  an  awful  shock,  a  cry,  a  single  cry, 
an  immense  cry,  arms  stretched  out,  hands  that 
clutch,  eyes  aghast,  o'er  which  the  vision  of  death 
passes  in  a  flash  — 

Oh,  mercy !  .  . 

It  was  thus  that  I  spent  the  whole  night  in  dream- 
ing, in  evoking,  after  a  space  of  ten  years,  the  soul 


The  Wreck  of  the  "  Semillante."       71 

of  that  poor  ship  whose  fragments  surrounded  me. 
Afar,  in  the  straits,  the  storm  was  raging;  the 
flame  of  the  bivouac  bent  to  the  blast !  and  I  heard 
our  boat  tossing  below  at  the  foot  of  the  rocks  and 
straining  at  her  hawser. 


72  Letters  from  My  Mill. 


CUSTOM-HOUSE   PEOPLE. 

A  FEW  years  ago,  the  inspector-general  of  cus- 
toms in  Corsica  took  me  on  one  of  his  rounds 
along  the  coast.  Without  seeming  to  be  so,  it 
was  really  a  very  long  voyage.  Forty  days  at  sea, 
almost  as  long  as  it  takes  to  go  to  Havana,  and 
this  in  an  old  boat  with  a  half-deck  where  nothing 
sheltered  us  from  wind,  waves,  and  rain  but  a 
little  tarred  roof  scarcely  large  enough  to  cover 
two  berths  and  a  table.  It  was  a  sight  to  see  the 
sailors  in  bad  weather.  Their  faces  streamed; 
their  soaked  jackets  smoked  like  linen  in  the 
drying-room.  In  mid-winter  the  poor  fellows 
passed  whole  days  in  this  condition,  and  even 
nights,  crouched  on  their  wet  benches,  shivering 
in  that  unhealthy  dampness;  for  it  was  quite 
impossible  to  light  a  fire  on  board  and  the  shore 
was  sometimes  difficult  to  reach.  Well,  not  a 
single  one  of  those  men  complained.  In  the 
roughest  weather  I  always  saw  them  just  as  placid, 
and  in  just  the  same  good-humour.  And  yet, 
what  a  melancholy  life  it  is,  that  of  custom-house 
sailors ! 

Nearly  all  of  them  are  married,  with  wife  and  chil- 
dren ashore,  yet  they  stay  months  at  sea,  cruising 


Custom- House  People.  73 

around  those  dangerous  coasts.  By  way  of  food 
they  have  nothing  but  damp  bread  and  wild 
onions.  Never  wine  or  meat,  for  wine  and  meat 
cost  dear  and  all  they  earn  is  five  hundred  francs 
a  year.  Five  hundred  francs  a  year !  you  can 
imagine  what  the  hovel  must  be  on  the  Marina  and 
whether  the  children  go  barefoot.  No  matter ! 
they  all  seem  happy,  those  people.  In  front  of 
the  cabin,  aft,  stood  a  great  cask  of  rain-water,  at 
which  the  crew  drank;  and  I  remember  that 
when  they  had  taken  their  last  swallow,  each  of 
the  poor  devils  shook  out  his  glass  with  an 
"  Ah ! "  of  satisfaction,  an  expression  of  comfort 
both  comical  and  affecting. 

The  gayest  and  most  contented  of  all  was  a 
little  Bonifacian,  squat  and  swarthy,  called  Palombo. 
He  was  always  singing,  even  in  the  worst  weather. 
When  the  waves  were  high  and  the  sky,  dark  and 
lowering,  was  full  of  sleet,  and  all  were  standing, 
their  noses  in  the  air,  hands  to  the  sheet,  watching 
the  coming  gust,  then,  in  the  great  silence  and 
anxiety  of  all  on  board,  the  tranquil  voice  of 
Palombo  would  begin  :  — 

u  JVon,  mon-seigneur^ 
Oest  trop  d  ^honneur^ 
Lisette  est  sa-agey 
Reste  au  villa-age" 

And  the  squall  might  blow,  shaking  and  sub- 
merging the  vessel  and  making  the  rigging  moan, 
the  sailor's  song  continued,  floating  like  a  gull  on 
the  breast  of  the  waves.  Sometimes  the  wind 
played  too  strong  an  accompaniment  and  the 


74  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

words  were  drowned ;  but  between  each  dash  of 
the  seas  as  the  water  ran  out  of  the  scuppers,  the 
chorus  was  heard  again :  — 

"  Lisette  est  sa-age, 
Reste  au  villa-age" 

One  day,  however,  it  rained  and  blew  so  hard  I 
did  not  hear  it.  This  was  so  extraordinary  that  I 
put  my  head  out  of  the  cabin.  "  Hey !  Palombo, 
why  don't  you  sing?"  Palombo  did  not  answer. 
He  was  motionless,  lying  on  his  bench.  I  went 
out  to  him.  His  teeth  were  chattering;  his 
whole  body  trembled  with  fever.  "  He  has  got  the 
potmtoura"  said  his  comrades,  sadly.  What  they 
called  pountoura  is  a  stitch  in  the  side,  a  pleurisy. 
The  great  leaden  sky,  the  streaming  vessel,  the 
poor  feverish  soul  wrapped  in  an  old  india-rubber 
coat  which  glistened  in  the  rain  like  a  seal's 
back  —  I  never  saw  anything  more  lugubrious. 
Soon  the  cold,  the  wind,  the  dashing  of  the  waves 
aggravated  his  trouble.  Delirium  seized  him;  it 
was  necessary  to  put  him  ashore. 

After  much  time  and  many  efforts  we  entered, 
towards  evening,  a  little  harbour,  silent  and  barren, 
where  nothing  stirred  but  the  circular  sweep  of  a 
few  gulls.  Around  the  shore  rose  high,  scarped 
rocks  and  impermeable  thickets  of  shrubs  of  a  dull 
green,  perennial  and  without  season.  Low  down, 
near  the  water,  was  a  little  white  house  with  gray 
shutters,  the  custom-house  post.  In  the  midst  of 
this  desert,  the  government  building,  numbered 
like  a  uniform  cap,  had  something  sinister  about  it. 


Custom-House  People.  75 

There  poor  Palombo  was  put  ashore.  Melancholy 
haven  for  a  sick  man.  We  found  the  custom-house 
official  in  charge  of  the  place  supping  with  his  wife 
and  children  in  the  chimney-corner.  All  these 
people  had  haggard,  yellow  faces,  and  large  eyes 
circled  with  fever.  The  mother,  still  young,  with 
a  baby  in  her  arms,  shivered  as  she  spoke  to  us. 
"  It  is  a  terrible  post,"  the  inspector  said  to  me  in 
a  low  voice.  "  We  are  obliged  to  renew  our  men 
here  every  two  years.  The  fever  of  that  marsh 
eats  them  up." 

It  was  necessary  to  get  a  doctor.  There  was 
none  nearer  than  Sartena,  and  that  was  six  or  eight 
leagues  distant.  What  was  to  be  done?  Our 
sailors  were  tired  out  and  could  do  no  more,  and 
it  was  too  far  to  send  a  child.  Then  the  wife, 
looking  out  of  the  door,  called  "  Cecco  !  Cecco  !  " 
and  a  tall,  well  set-up  young  fellow  entered,  true 
type  of  a  smuggler  or  a  bandit,  with  his  brown 
woollen  cap  and  his  goatskin  mantle.  As  we  landed 
I  had  noticed  him  sitting  before  the  door,  his  red 
pipe  in  his  mouth  and  his  gun  between  his  legs ; 
but  he  disappeared,  I  knew  not  why,  at  our 
approach.  Perhaps  he  thought  gendarmes  were 
with  us.  As  he  entered,  the  wife  coloured  a  little. 
"  This  is  my  cousin,"  she  said.  "  No  danger  that 
he  will  get  lost  in  the  thicket."  Then  she  spoke 
to  him  in  a  low  voice  and  showed  him  the  patient. 
The  man  nodded  without  replying,  went  out, 
whistled  to  his  dog,  and  started,  his  gun  on  his 
shoulder,  springing  from  rock  to  rock  with  his 
long  legs. 


76  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

During  this  time  the  children,  whom  the  presence 
of  the  inspector  seemed  to  terrify,  finished  their 
dinner  of  chestnuts  and  bruccio  (white  cheese). 
Water,  nothing  but  water  on  the  table  !  And  yet 
what  good  a  drop  of  wine  would  have  done  them, 
poor  little  things.  Ah,  poverty !  .  .  At  last  the 
mother  took  them  up  to  bed ;  the  father  lighted 
his  lantern  and  went  to  inspect  the  coast,  and  we 
sat  still  by  the  fire  to  watch  our  sick  man,  who 
tossed  on  his  pallet  as  if  at  sea  shaken  by  the 
waves.  To  quiet  his  pountoura  a  little  we  warmed 
pebbles  and  bricks  and  laid  them  at  his  side. 
Once  or  twice  when  I  approached  his  bed  the  poor 
fellow  knew  me,  and  to  thank  me  stretched  out  his 
hand  with  difficulty,  a  large  hand,  rough  and  burn- 
ing as  one  of  those  bricks  we  took  from  the  fire. 

Sad  watch !  Outside,  the  bad  weather  had  re- 
turned with  the  close  of  day.  All  was  uproar,  the 
rolling  of  waves,  the  dashing  of  spray,  the  battle  of 
rocks  and  water.  From  time  to  time  the  tempest 
on  the  open  sea  succeeded  in  entering  the  bay  and 
swirling  around  the  house.  We  felt  it  in  the  sud- 
den rise  of  the  flame  which  lighted  the  mournful 
faces  of  the  sailors  grouped  around  the  chimney 
and  looking  at  the  fire  with  that  placidity  of  ex- 
pression given  by  the  habitual  presence  of  great 
expanse  and  far  horizons.  Sometimes  Palombo 
gently  moaned ;  and  then  all  eyes  were  turned  to 
the  dark  corner  where  the  poor  comrade  was  dying 
far  from  his  family  and  without  succour ;  the  chests 
heaved  and  I  heard  great  sighs.  That  was  all  that 
the  sense  of  their  unfortunate  lot  drew  from  these 


Custom-House  People. 


77 


gentle  and  patient  toilers  of  the  sea.  A  sigh,  and 
nothing  more  !  Stay,  I  am  wrong.  Passing  before 
me  to  throw  a  clod  on  the  fire,  one  of  them  said 
in  a  low  and  heart-breaking  voice:  "You  see 
monsieur,  we  have  sometimes  great  troubles  in  our 
business." 


78  Letters  from  My  Mill. 


THE  CURE  OF  CUCUGNAN. 

EVERY  year  at  Candlemas  the  Provensal  poets 
publish  at  Avignon  a  jovial  little  book  full  to  the 
brim  of  merry  tales  and  pretty  verses.  That  of 
this  year  has  just  reached  me,  and  in  it  I  find  an 
adorable  fabliau  which  I  shall  try  to  translate  for 
you,  slightly  abridging  it.  Parisians !  hold  out 
your  sacks.  It  is  the  finest  brand  of  Provencal 
flour  that  I  serve  you  this  day. 

The  Abbe*  Martin  was  cure*  of  Cucugnan. 

Good  as  bread,  honest  as  gold,  he  loved  his 
Cucugnanese  paternally.  To  him,  Cucugnan  would 
have  been  heaven  upon  earth  if  the  Cucugnanese 
had  given  him  a  little  more  satisfaction.  But  alas ! 
the  spiders  spun  their  webs  in  his  confessional,  and 
on  the  glorious  Easter-day  the  Host  remained  in 
the  holy  pyx.  This  harrowed  the  heart  of  the 
worthy  priest,  and  he  was  always  asking  God  to 
grant  that  he  might  not  die  until  he  had  brought 
back  to  the  fold  his  scattered  flock. 

Now  you  shall  see  how  God  listened  to  him. 

One  Sunday,  after  the  Gospel,  M.  Martin  went 
up  into  the  pulpit. 

"  Brethren,"  he  said,  "  you  may  believe  me  if 
you  like :  the  other  night  I  found  myself,  I,  a 
miserable  sinner,  at  the  gates  of  Paradise. 


The  Cure  of  Cucugnan.  79 

"  I  rapped  ;   Saint  Peter  came. 

" '  Bless  me !  is  it  you,  my  worthy  Monsieur 
Martin?'  he  said  to  me.  'What  good  wind  has 
brought  you  ?  what  can  I  do  for  you  ? ' 

"  '  Great  Saint  Peter,  you  who  hold  the  big  book 
^and  the  keys,  would  you  tell  me,  if  I  am  not 
too  curious,  how  many  Cucugnanese  you  have  in 
Paradise?' 

"  '  I  can't  refuse  you  anything,  Monsieur  Martin ; 
sit  down ;  we  will  look  the  thing  out  together.' 

"  And  Saint  Peter  got  out  his  big  book,  opened 
it,  and  put  on  his  spectacles. 

"  '  Let  me  see :  Cucugnan,  did  you  say?  Cu  .  .  . 
Cu  .  .  .  Cucugnan.  Here  we  are,  Cucugnan.  .  . 
My  dear  Monsieur  Martin,  it  is  a  blank  page.  Not 
a  soul.  .  .  No  more  Cucugnanese  in  Paradise  than 
fishbones  in  a  turkey.' 

"'What!  No  one  from  Cucugnan  here?  No 
one?  It  is  n't  possible  !  Do  look  again.' 

" '  No  one,  holy  man.  Look  yourself  if  you 
think  I  am  joking.' 

"  '  I,  ptcaire  ! '  I  stamped  my  feet  and  I  cried 
for  mercy  with  clasped  hands.  Whereupon  Saint 
Peter  said :  — 

"  '  Monsieur  Martin,  you  must  not  turn  your  heart 
inside  out  in  this  way,  or  you  '11  have  a  fit  of  some 
kind.  It  is  n't  your  fault,  after  all.  Those  Cu- 
cugnanese of  yours,  don't  you  see,  they  '11  have  to 
do  their  quarantine  in  purgatory.' 

"  '  Oh !  for  pity's  sake,  great  Saint  Peter,  let 
me  just  go  to  purgatory  for  a  minute  to  see  them 
and  comfort  them.' 


80  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

"  '  Willingly,  my  friend.  .  .  Here,  put  on  these 
sandals,  for  the  roads  are  none  too  good.  That 's 
right.  Now  go  straight  before  you.  Don't  you 
see  a  turning  a  long  way  down?  There  you'll 
find  a  silver  door  all  studded  with  black  crosses  — 
on  your  right.  Knock,  and  they'll  open  to  you.t 
Adieu  !  Keep  well  and  lively.' 

"Down  I  went — down,  down!  What  a  strug- 
gle !  My  flesh  creeps  for  only  thinking  of  it. 
A  narrow  path,  full  of  briers  and  big  shiny 
beetles  and  snakes  hissing,  brought  me  to  the 
silver  door. 

"Pan!  pan! 

111  Who  knocks?'  said  a  hoarse  and  dismal  voice. 

"  '  The  cure  of  Cucugnan.1 

«<Of  —  ?' 

" '  Of  Cucugnan.' 

"  <  Ah  !  .  .  Come  in.' 

"  I  went  in.  A  tall,  handsome  angel  with  wings 
black  as  night  and  a  garment  resplendent  as  day, 
and  a  diamond  key  hanging  to  his  belt,  was  writ- 
ing, era-era,  in  a  big  book  —  bigger  than  that  of 
Saint  Peter. 

"'Now  then,  what  do  you  want?1  asked  the 
angel. 

"  '  Noble  angel  of  God,  I  want  to  know  —  per- 
haps you  '11  think  me  very  inquisitive  —  whether 
my  Cucugnanese  are  here.' 

" '  Your  —  ?  ' 

" '  Cucugnanese,  the  inhabitants  of  Cucugnan. 
I  am  their  prior.' 


The  Cure  of  Cucugnan.  81 

"  '  Ah,  yes  !  the  Abbe"  Martin,  isn't  it?  ' 
"  '  At  your  service,  Monsieur  Angel.' 

"  'You  say  Cucugnan  — ' 

"  And  the  angel  opened  his  big  book,  wetting 
his  finger  with  his  spittle  to  turn  the  leaves  easily. 

" '  Cucugnan/  he  said,  with  a  heavy  sigh.  '  Mon- 
sieur Martin,  we  have  n't  a  soul  in  purgatory  from 
Cucugnan.' 

"  '  Jesu  !  Marie  !  Joseph  !  not  a  soul  from  Cu- 
cugnan in  purgatory !  Then,  great  God !  where 
are  they?' 

"  '  Eh  !  holy  man  !  they  are  in  paradise.  Where 
the  deuce  do  you  suppose  they  are? ' 

"  '  But  I  have  just  come  from  there,  from  para- 
dise.' 

"  '  You  have  come  from  there !     Well  ? ' 

"  '  They  are  not  there  !  .  .  Ah  !  merciful  mother 
of  angels  !  .  .' 

"  '  But,  holy  man,  if  they  are  not  in  paradise  and 
not  in  purgatory,  there  is  no  middle  place,  they 
are  in  — ' 

"  '  Holy  Cross  !  Jesus,  son  of  David  !  Aie  ! 
aie!  aie!  it  isn't  possible?  Can  it  be  that  the 
great  Saint  Peter  lied  to  me  ?  I  did  n't  hear  a 
cock  crow.  .  .  Aie  !  poor  people  !  and  poor  me  ! 
for  how  can  I  go  to  paradise  if  my  Cucugnanese 
are  not  there  ? ' 

" '  Listen  to  me,  my  poor  Monsieur  Martin. 
As  you  want  to  be  so  sure  about  this  thing,  cost 
what  it  may,  and  to  see  with  your  own  eyes  what 
there  is  to  it,  take  this  path  and  run  fast,  if  you 

6 


82  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

know  how  to  run.  You  will  come  to  a  great  big 
portal  on  your  left.  There  you  can  find  out  every- 
thing. God  grants  it.' 

"  And  the  angel  shut  his  gate. 

"  'T  was  a  long  path,  paved  all  the  way  with  red 
embers.  I  tottered  as  if  I  were  drunk ;  at  every 
step  I  stumbled;  I  was  bathed  in  perspiration; 
every  hair  of  my  body  had  its  drop  of  sweat;  I 
panted  with  thirst.  But  thanks  to  the  sandals  that 
good  Saint  Peter  lent  me,  I  did  not  burn  my  feet. 

"  After  I  had  made  many  a  limping  misstep  1 
saw  at  my  left  hand  a  gate  —  no,  a  portal,  an 
enormous  portal,  gaping  wide  open,  like  the  door 
of  a  big  oven.  O !  my  children,  what  a  sight ! 
There,  no  one  asked  my  name ;  there,  no  register. 
In  batches,  in  crowds,  people  entered,  just  as  you, 
my  brethren,  go  to  the  wineshops  on  Sunday. 

"I  sweated  great  drops,  and  yet  I  was  chilled 
to  the  bone  and  shuddering.  My  hair  stood  erect. 
I  smelt  burning,  roasting  flesh,  something  like  the 
smell  that  fills  all  Cucugnan  when  Eloy  the  black- 
smith burns  the  hoof  of  an  old  donkey  as  he  shoes 
her.  I  lost  my  breath  in  that  stinking,  fiery  air ; 
I  heard  an  awful  clamour,  moans,  howls,  oaths. 

"  '  Well !  are  you,  or  are  you  not  coming  in, 
you?'  said  a  horned  demon,  pricking  me  with  his 
pitchfork. 

" '  I?   I  don't  go  in  there.    I  am  a  friend  of  God.' 

"  '  A  friend  of  God  !  Hey  !  you  scabby  rascal ! 
what  are  you  doing  here  ?  ' 

"  '  I  have  come  —  ah  !  I  can't  talk  of  it,  my  legs 


The  Cure  of  Cucugnan.  83 

are  giving  way  under  me.  I  have  come  —  I  have 
come  a  long  way — to  humbly  ask  you  —  if — if 
by  chance  —  you  have  here  —  some  one  —  some 
one  from  Cucugnan  — ' 

"  '  Ha !  fire  of  God !  you  are  playing  stupid, 
are  you?  Just  as  if  you  didn't  know  that  all 
Cucugnan  is  here.  There,  you  ugly  crow,  look 
there,  and  see  how  we  treat  'em  here,  your 
precious  Cucugnanese  — ' 

"  I  looked,  and  saw,  in  the  midst  of  awful,  whirl- 
ing flames, — 

"That  long  Coq-Galine,  —  you  all  knew  him,  my 
brethren,  —  Coq-Galine,  who  got  drunk  so  often 
and  shook  his  fleas  on  his  poor  Clairette. 

"  I  saw  Catarinet  —  that  little  slut  with  her  nose 
in  the  air  —  who  slept  alone  in  the  barn  —  you 
remember,  you  rascals  ?  But  that  's  enough  — 
enough  said. 

"  I  saw  Pascal  Doigt-de-Pois  who  made  his  oil 
of  M.  Julien's  olives. 

"  I  saw  Babette  the  gleaner,  who,  when  she 
gleaned,  grabbed  handfuls  from  the  sheaves  to 
fill  her  bundle. 

"  I  saw  Maitre  Grabasi,  who  oiled  the  wheel  of 
his  barrow  so  slick ; 

"  And  Dauphine,  who  sold  the  water  of  his  well 
so  dear; 

"  And  Tortillard,  who,  when  he  met  me  carrying 
the  Good  God,  kept  on  his  way  as  if  he  had  only 
met  a  dog,  —  pipe  in  his  mouth,  cap  on  his  head, 
proud  as  Artaban. 


84  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

"  And  I  saw  Coulau  with  his  Zette,  and  Jacques, 
and  Pierre,  and  Toni.  .  .  " 

Livid  with  fear,  the  audience  groaned,  beholding, 
through  the  opened  gates  of  hell,  this  one  his  father, 
that  one  her  mother,  some  their  grandmothers,  some 
their  brothers  and  sisters. 

"  You  feel  now,  my  brethren,"  said  the  good 
abbe,  "that  this  must  not  go  on  any  longer.  I 
have  the  charge  of  souls,  and  I  wish  to  save  you, 
I  wt/lsave  you,  from  the  abyss  to  which  you  are  all 
rolling  head-foremost.  To-morrow  I  shall  set  to 
work — no  later  than  to-morrow.  And  I  shall  have 
my  hands  full.  This  is  what  I  shall  do.  In  order  to 
do  it  well,  it  must  be  done  methodically.  We  will 
go  row  by  row,  as  at  Jonquieres  when  you  dance. 

"  To-morrow,  Monday,  I  shall  confess  the  old 
men  and  the  old  women.  That 's  nothing. 

"  Tuesday,  the  children.     Soon  done. 

"Wednesday,  the  lads  and  lasses.  May  take 
long. 

"  Thursday,  the  men.     Cut  them  short. 

"  Friday,  the  women.    I  shall  say :  No  rigmaroles. 

"  Saturday,  the  miller  !  One  whole  day  is  not  too 
much  for  him  alone. 

"  And  Sunday  it  will  all  be  done,  and  we  shall 
be  happy. 

"  You  know,  my  children,  that  when  the  wheat 
is  ripe  it  must  be  cut ;  when  the  wine  is  drawn  it 
must  be  drunk.  Here 's  a  lot  of  dirty  linen  to 
wash,  and  it  must  be  washed,  and  well  washed. 

"  That  is  the  good  I  wish  you.     Amen." 


The  Cure  of  Cucugnan.  85 

What  was  said  was  done.  The  wash  came  off. 
And  since  that  memorable  Sunday  the  fragrance 
of  the  virtues  of  Cucugnan  can  be  smelt  in  an  area 
of  ten  leagues  round. 

And  the  good  pastor,  M.  Martin,  happy  and  gay, 
dreamed  the  other  night  that,  followed  by  his  whole 
flock,  he  mounted,  in  resplendent  procession,  amid 
gleaming  torches,  and  clouds  of  incense  wafted  by 
the  choir-boys  chanting  the  Te  Deum,  the  great 
lighted  road  to  the  City  of  our  God. 

Now  there  's  the  tale  of  the  cure"  of  Cucugnan, 
such  as  that  great  rascal  Roumanille  ordered  me 
to  tell  it  to  you ;  he  himself  having  got  it  from 
some  other  good  fellow. 


86  Letters  from  My  Mill. 


AGED  FOLK. 

"  A  LETTER,  Pere  Azan?  " 

"  Yes,  monsieur ;  and  it  comes  from  Paris." 

He  was  quite  proud,  that  worthy  old  Azan,  that 
it  came  from  Paris.  I  was  not.  Something  told 
me  that  that  Parisian  missive  from  the  rue  Jean- 
Jacques,  dropping  thus  upon  my  table  unexpect- 
edly, and  so  early  in  the  morning,  would  make  me 
lose  my  whole  day.  I  was  not  mistaken,  —  and 
you  shall  see  why. 

"  You  must  do  me  a  service,  my  friend,"  said 
the  letter.  "  Close  your  mill  for  a  day,  and  go  to 
Eyguieres.  Eyguieres  is  a  large  village,  three  or 
four  leagues  from  your  mill,  —  a  pleasant  walk. 
When  you  get  there,  ask  for  the  Orphans'  Con- 
vent. The  first  house  beyond  the  convent  is  a 
low  building  with  gray  shutters,  and  a  small  garden 
behind  it.  Enter  without  knocking,  —  the  door  is 
always  open,  —  and  as  you  enter,  call  out  very 
loud  :  *  Good-day,  worthy  people  !  I  am  a  friend 
of  Maurice.'  On  which  you  will  see  two  little  old 
persons  —  oh  !  but  old,  old,  ever  so  old  —  stretch- 
ing out  their  hands  to  you  from  their  big  arm- 
chairs ;  and  you  are  to  kiss  them  for  me,  with  all 
your  heart,  as  if  they  were  yours,  your  own  friends. 
Then  you  will  talk.  They  will  talk  to  you  of  me, 


Aged  Folk.  87 

and  nothing  else;  they  will  say  a  lot  of  foolish 
things,  which  you  are  to  listen  to  without  laughing. 
You  won't  laugh,  will  you  ?  They  are  my  grand- 
parents; two  beings  whose  very  life  I  am,  and 
who  have  not  seen  me  these  ten  years.  .  .  Ten 
years,  a  long  time  !  But  how  can  I  help  it?  Paris 
clutches  me.  And  they,  they  are  so  old  that  if 
they  came  to  see  me  they  would  break  to  bits  on 
the  way.  .  .  Happily,  you  are  there,  my  dear 
miller,  and,  in  kissing  you,  these  poor  old  people 
will  fancy  they  are  kissing  me.  I  have  so  often 
told  them  about  you,  and  of  the  good  friendship 
that—" 

The  devil  take  good  friendship  !  Just  this  very 
morning,  when  the  weather  is  so  beautiful !  but  not 
at  all  fit  to  tramp  along  the  roads ;  too  much  mis- 
tral, too  much  sun,  a  regular  Provence  day.  When 
that  cursed  letter  came,  I  had  just  picked  out  my 
shelter  between  two  rocks,  where  I  dreamed  of 
staying  all  day  like  a  lizard,  drinking  light  and 
listening  to  the  song  of  the  pines.  Well,  I  could  not 
help  myself.  I  shut  up  the  mill,  grumbling,  and  hid 
the  key.  My  stick,  my  pipe,  and  off  I  went. 

I  reached  Eyguieres  in  about  two  hours.  The 
village  was  deserted  ;  everybody  was  in  the  fields. 
From  the  elms  in  the  courtyards,  white  with  dust, 
the  grasshoppers  were  screaming.  To  be  sure,  in 
the  square  before  the  mayor's  office,  a  donkey  was 
sunning  himself,  and  a  flock  of  pigeons  were  dab- 
bling in  the  fountain  before  the  church,  but  no  one 
able  to  show  me  the  Orphans'  Convent.  Happily, 


88  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

an  old  witch  suddenly  appeared,  crouching  and 
knitting  iruthe  angle  of  her  doorway.  I  told  her 
what  I  was  looking  for ;  and  as  she  was  a  witch  of 
very  great  power,  she  had  only  to  raise  her  distaff, 
and,  behold !  the  Orphans'  Convent  rose  up  before 
me.  It  was  a  large,  sullen,  black  house,  proud  of 
exhibiting  above  its  arched  portal  an  old  cross  of 
red  freestone  with  Latin  around  it.  Beside  this 
house,  I  saw  another,  very  small;  gray  shutters, 
garden  behind  it.  I  knew  it  directly,  and  I  entered 
without  knocking. 

All  my  life  I  shall  remember  that  long,  cool, 
quiet  corridor,  the  walls  rose-tinted,  the  little  gar- 
den quivering  at  the  other  end,  and  seen  through  a 
thin  blind.  It  seemed  to  me  that  I  was  entering 
the  house  of  some  old  bailiff  of  the  olden  time  of 
Sedaine.  At  the  end  of  the  passage,  on  the  left, 
through  a  half-opened  door,  I  heard  the  tick-tack 
of  a  large  clock  and  the  voice  of  a  child  —  a  child 
in  school  —  who  was  reading  aloud,  and  paus- 
ing at  each  syllable :  "  Then — Saint — I-re-ne-us 
—  cri-ed  —  out — I — am  —  the  —  wheat —  of —  the 
Lord — I — must —  be  — ground  —  by  —  the  —  teeth 
— of — these — an-i-mals."  I  softly  approached  the 
door  and  looked  in. 

In  the  quiet  half-light  of  a  little  room,  an  old, 
old  man  with  rosy  cheeks,  wrinkled  to  the  tips  of 
his  fingers,  sat  sleeping  in  a  chair,  his  mouth  open, 
his  hands  on  his  knees.  At  his  feet,  a  little  girl 
dressed  in  blue — with  a  great  cape  and  a  linen 
cap,  the  orphans'  costume  —  was  reading  the  life 
of  Saint  Irenaeus  in  a  book  that  was  bigger  than 


Aged  Folk.  89 

herself.  The  reading  had  operated  miraculously 
on  the  entire  household.  The  old  man  slept  in 
his  chair,  the  flies  on  the  ceiling,  the  canaries  in 
their  cage  at  the  window,  and  the  great  clock 
snored :  tick-tack,  tick-tack.  Nothing  was  awake 
in  the  room  but  a  broad  band  of  light,  which  came, 
straight  and  white,  between  the  closed  shutters,  full 
of  lively  sparkles  and  microscopic  whirlings. 

Amid  this  general  somnolence,  the  child  went 
gravely  on  with  her  reading :  — 

"  Im-me-di-ate-ly — two — li-ons — dart-ed — up- 
on— him — and — ate — him — up."  At  this  moment 
I  entered  the  room.  The  lions  of  Saint  Irenaeus 
darting  into  the  room  could  not  have  produced 
greater  stupefaction.  A  regular  stage  effect !  The 
little  one  gave  a  cry,  the  big  book  fell,  the  flies 
and  the  canaries  woke,  the  clock  struck,  the  old 
man  started  up,  quite  frightened,  and  I  myself, 
being  rather  troubled,  stopped  short  on  the  sill  of 
the  door,  and  called  out  very  loud :  "  Good-day, 
worthy  people  !  I  am  Maurice's  friend." 

Oh,  then !  if  you  had  only  seen  him,  that  old 
man,  if  you  had  only  seen  how  he  came  to  me  with 
outstretched  arms,  embracing  me,  pressing  my 
hands,  and  wandering  about  the  room,  crying 
out:  — 

"  Mon  Dieu  !  man  Dieu  !  " 

All  the  wrinkles  of  his  face  were  laughing.  He 
was  red.  He  stuttered  :  — 

"  Ah  !  monsieur  —  ah  !  monsieur." 

Then  he  went  to  the  back  of  the  room  and 
called :  — 


90  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

11  Mamette !  " 

A  door  opened,  a  trot  of  mice  in  the  corridor — it 
was  Mamette.  Nothing  prettier  than  that  little  old 
woman  with  her  mob-cap,  her  brown  gown,  and  the 
embroidered  handkerchief  which  she  held  in  her 
hand  in  the  olden  fashion.  Most  affecting  thing ! 
the  two  were  like  each  other.  With  a  false  front 
and  yellow  bows  to  his  cap,  he  too  might  be  called 
Mamette.  Only,  the  real  Mamette  must  have  wept 
a  great  deal  in  her  life,  for  she  was  even  more 
wrinkled  than  he.  Like  him,  she  too  had  an  or- 
phan with  her,  a  little  nurse  in  a  blue  cape  who 
never  left  her ;  and  to  see  these  old  people  pro- 
tected by  those  orphans  was  indeed  the  most 
touching  thing  you  can  imagine. 

On  entering,  Mamette  began  to  make  me  a  deep 
curtsey,  but  a  word  of  the  old  man  stopped  her  in 
the  middle  of  it :  — 

"A  friend  of  Maurice." 

Instantly  she  trembled,  she  wept,  dropped  her 
handkerchief,  grew  red,  very  red,  redder  than  he. 
Those  aged  folk !  who  have  hardly  a  drop  of 
blood  in  their  veins,  how  it  flies  to  their  face  at 
the  least  emotion ! 

"  Quick,  quick,  a  chair,"  said  the  old  lady  to  her 
little  girl. 

"  Open  the  shutters,"  said  the  old  man  to  his. 

Then  taking  me  each  by  a  hand  they  led  me, 
trotting  along,  to  the  window  the  better  to  see  me. 
The  armchairs  were  placed ;  I  sat  between  the  two 
on  a  stool,  the  little  Blues  behind  us,  and  the  ques- 
tioning began : — 


Aged  Folk.  91 

"  How  is  he?  What  is  he  doing?  Why  doesn't 
he  come?  Is  he  happy?" 

Patati,  patata !  and  so  on  for  two  hours. 

I  answered  as  best  I  could  all  their  ques- 
tions, giving  such  details  about  my  friend  as 
I  knew,  and  boldly  inventing  others  that  I  did 
not  know;  being  careful  to  avoid  admitting  that 
I  had  never  noticed  whether  his  windows  closed 
tightly  and  what  coloured  paper  he  had  on  his 
walls. 

"The  paper  of  his  bedroom?  blue,  madame,  light 
blue,  with  garlands  of  flowers  —  " 

"  Really !  "  said  the  old  lady,  much  affected ; 
then  she  added,  turning  to  her  husband :  "  He  is 
such  a  dear  lad  !  " 

"  Yes,  yes !  a  dear  lad !  "  said  the  other,  with 
enthusiasm. 

And  all  the  time  that  I  was  speaking  they  kept 
up  between  them  little  nods,  and  sly  laughs  and 
winks,  and  knowing  looks;  or  else  the  old  man 
came  closer  to  say  in  my  ear :  — 

"  Speak  louder,  she  is  a  little  hard  of  hearing." 

And  she  on  her  side  :  — 

"  A  little  louder,  if  you  please.  He  does  n't  hear 
very  well." 

Then  I  raised  my  voice,  and  both  of  them 
thanked  me  with  a  smile;  and  in  those  faded 
smiles,  —  bending  toward  me,  seeking  in  the  depths 
of  my  eyes  the  image  of  their  Maurice,  —  I  was, 
myself,  quite  moved  to  see  that  image,  vague, 
veiled,  almost  imperceptible,  as  if  I  beheld  my 
friend  smiling  to  me  from  afar  through  a  mist. 


92  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

^Suddenly  the  old  man  sat  upright  in  his  chair. 

"  I  have  just  thought,  Mamette,  —  perhaps  he 
has  not  breakfasted  !  " 

And  Mamette,  distressed,  throws  up  her  arms. 

"  Not  breakfasted  !   oh,  heavens  !  " 

I  thought  they  were  still  talking  of  Maurice,  and 
I  was  about  to  say  that  that  worthy  lad  never 
waited  later  than  noon  for  his  breakfast.  But  no, 
it  was  of  me  they  were  thinking ;  and  it  was  in- 
deed a  sight  to  see  their  commotion  when  I  had  to 
own  that  I  was  still  fasting. 

"  Quick  !  set  the  table,  little  Blues  !  That  table 
in  the  middle  of  the  room  —  the  Sunday  cloth  — 
the  flowered  plates.  And  no  laughing,  if  you 
please  !  Make  haste,  make  haste  !  " 

And  haste  they  made.  Only  time  to  break 
three  plates  and  breakfast  was  served. 

"  A  good  little  breakfast,"  said  Mamette,  leading 
me  to  the  table ;  "  only,  you  must  eat  it  alone.  We 
have  eaten  already." 

Poor  old  people !  at  whatever  hour  you  took 
them,  they  had  "  eaten  already." 

Mamette's  good  little  breakfast  was  a  cup  of 
milk,  dates,  and  a  barquette,  a  kind  of  shortcake, 
no  doubt  enough  to  feed  her  canaries  for  a  week ; 
and  to  think  that  I,  alone,  I  ate  up  all  their  provi- 
sions !  I  felt  the  indignation  around  the  table ;  the 
little  Blues  whispered  and  nudged  each  other ;  and 
those  canaries  in  their  cage,  —  I  knew  they  were 
saying :  "  Oh !  that  monsieur,  he  is  eating  up  the 
whole  of  the  barquette!  " 

I  did  eat  it  all,  truly,  almost  without  perceiving 


Aged  Folk.  93 

that  I  did  so,  preoccupied  as  I  was  by  looking 
round  that  light  and  placid  room,  where  floated, 
as  it  were,  the  fragrance  of  things  ancient.  Espe- 
cially noticeable  were  two  little  beds  from  which  I 
could  not  detach  my  eyes.  Those  beds,  almost 
two  cradles,  I  pictured  them  in  the  morning  at 
dawn,  still  inclosed  within  their  great  fringed  cur- 
tains. Three  o  'clock  strikes.  That  is  the  hour 
when  old  people  wake. 

"Are  you  asleep,  Mamette?" 

"  No,  my  friend." 

"  Is  n't  Maurice  a  fine  lad?  " 

"  Yes,  yes,  a  fine  lad." 

And  from  that  I  imagined  a  long  conversation 
by  merely  looking  at  the  little  beds  of  the  two  old 
people,  standing  side  by  side. 

During  this  time  a  terrible  drama  was  going  on 
at  the  other  end  of  the  room  before  a  closet.  It 
concerned  reaching  up  to  the  top  shelf  for  a  cer- 
tain bottle  of  brandied  cherries  which  had  awaited 
Maurice's  return  for  the  last  ten  years.  The  old 
people  now  proposed  to  open  it  for  me.  In  spite 
of  Mamette's  supplications  the  husband  was  deter- 
mined to  get  the  cherries  himself,  and,  mounted  on 
a  chair  to  the  terror  of  his  wife,  he  was  striving  to 
reach  them.  You  can  see  the  scene  from  here: 
the  old  man  trembling  on  the  points  of  his  toes,  the 
little  Blues  clinging  to  his  chair,  Mamette  behind 
him,  breathless,  her  arms  extended,  and,  pervading 
all,  a  slight  perfume  of  bergamot  exhaled  from  the 
open  closet  and  the  great  piles  of  unbleached  linen 
therein  contained.  It  was  charming. 


94  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

At  last,  after  many  efforts,  they  succeeded  in 
getting  it  from  the  closet,  that  famous  bottle,  and 
with  it  an  old  silver  cup,  Maurice's  cup  when  he 
was  little.  This  they  filled  with  cherries  to  the 
brim  —  Maurice  was  so  fond  of  cherries  !  And 
while  the  old  man  served  me,  he  whispered  in  my 
ear,  as  if  his  mouth  watered :  — 

"  You  are  very  lucky,  you,  to  be  the  one  to  eat 
them.  My  wife  put  them  up.  You  '11  taste  some- 
thing good." 

Alas !  his  wife  had  put  them  up,  but  she  had 
forgotten  to  sweeten  them.  They  were  atrocious, 
your  cherries,  my  poor  Mamette  —  But  that  did 
not  prevent  me  from  eating  them  all  without 
blinking. 

The  meal  over,  I  rose  to  take  leave  of  my 
hosts.  They  would  fain  have  kept  me  longer  to 
talk  of  that  dear  lad,  but  the  day  was  shortening, 
the  mill  was  far,  and  I  had  to  go. 

The  old  man  rose  when  I  did. 

"  Mamette,  my  coat ;  I  will  accompany  him  as 
far  as  the  square." 

I  felt  very  sure  that  in  her  heart  Mamette 
thought  it  too  cool  for  the  old  man  to  be  out,  but 
she  did  not  show  it.  Only,  as  she  helped  him  to 
put  his  arms  into  the  sleeves  of  his  coat,  a  hand- 
some snuff-coloured  coat  with  mother-of-pearl  but- 
tons, I  heard  the  dear  creature  say  to  him  softly :  — 

"  You  won't  be  late,  will  you?  " 

And  he,  with  a  roguish  air :  — 

"  Hey !  hey !     I  don't  know  —  perhaps  not." 


Aged  Folk.  95 

Thereupon  they  looked  at  each  other,  laugh- 
ing, and  the  little  Blues  laughed  to  see  them  laugh, 
and  the  canaries  laughed  too,  in  their  cage,  after 
their  fashion.  Between  ourselves  I  think  the  smell 
of  those  cherries  had  made  them  all  a  little  tipsy. 

Daylight  was  fading  as  we  left  the  house,  grand- 
papa and  I.  A  little  Blue  followed  at  a  distance 
to  bring  him  back;  but  he  did  not  see  her,  and 
seemed  quite  proud  to  walk  along,  arm  in  arm 
with  me,  like  a  man.  Mamette,  beaming,  watched 
us  from  the  sill  of  her  door  with  pretty  little  nods 
of  her  head  that  seemed  to  say :  "  See  there  !  my 
poor  man,  he  can  still  walk  about." 


96  Letters  from  My  Mill. 


PROSE  BALLADS. 

WHEN  I  opened  my  door  this  morning  I  saw 
around  my  mill  a  carpet  of  hoar-frost.  The  turf 
cracked  and  glittered  like  glass;  the  hillside 
shivered.  For  a  single  day  my  dear  Provence 
disguised  herself  as  a  Northern  land ;  and  it  was 
among  pines  draped  with  frost  and  tufts  of  laven- 
der looking  like  crystal  bouquets  that  I  wrote  two 
ballads  of  rather  Germanic  fantasy,  while  the  ice- 
dew  sparkled  before  me,  and  away  up  there  in  the 
clear  blue  sky  triangular  flocks  of  storks,  coming 
from  the  country  of  Henri  Heine,  flew  towards 
the  Camargue,  crying  hoarsely :  "  It  is  cold  —  cold 
—  cold." 

I. 

THE  DEATH  OF  THE  DAUPHIN. 

THE  little  Dauphin  is  ill ;  the  little  Dauphin  will 
die.  In  all  the  churches  of  the  kingdom  the  Holy 
Sacrament  is  exposed  day  and  night,  and  great 
tapers  burn  for  the  recovery  of  the  royal  child. 
The  streets  of  the  old  Residenz  are  sad  and  silent ; 
the  bells  no  longer  ring;  carriages  are  driven  at 
a  foot-pace.  Around  the  palace  anxious  burghers 
watch,  through  the  iron  railings,  the  Swiss  porters 


Prose  Ballads.  97 

with  gilded  paunches  talking  in  the  courtyard  with 
airs  of  importance. 

The  whole  castle  is  a-quiver.  Chamberlains, 
majordomos  are  running  up  and  down  the  marble 
staircases.  The  galleries  are  filled  with  pages 
and  courtiers  in  silken  garments  going  from  one 
group  to  another,  asking  for  news  in  whispers.  On 
the  wide  porticos  ladies  of  honour  in  despair  are 
dropping  deep  curtseys  to  one  another  and  wiping 
their  eyes  with  embroidered  handkerchiefs. 

In  the  Orangery  is  a  numerous  assemblage  of 
physicians  in  their  robes.  They  are  seen  through 
the  sashes  to  shake  their  long  black  sleeves  and 
lean  their  clubbed  wigs  doctorally  to  one  another. 
The  preceptor  and  the  equerry  of  the  little  Dau- 
phin are  pacing  up  and  down  before  the  door 
awaiting  the  decision  of  the  Faculty.  Scullions 
pass  them  without  bowing.  The  equerry  swears 
like  a  pagan  ;  the  preceptor  recites  Horace.  And 
all  this  while,  from  the  stables  over  there,  comes 
a  plaintive  neigh.  'T  is  the  chestnut  pony  of  the 
little  Dauphin,  forgotten  by  the  grooms,  which  is 
whinnying  sadly  before  its  empty  manger. 

And  the  king?  Where  is  Monseigneur  the 
king?  The  king  is  shut  up  all  alone  in  a  room 
at  the  farther  end  of  the  castle.  Majesties  do  not 
like  to  be  seen  to  weep.  As  for  the  queen,  that 
is  another  thing.  Seated  by  the  pillow  of  the 
little  Dauphin,  her  beautiful  face  is  bathed  in  tears, 
and  she  sobs  aloud  as  any  shopkeeper's  wife 
might  do. 

Among  the  laces  of  his  couch  the  little  Dauphin, 

7 


98  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

whiter  than  the  pillows  on  which  he  lies,  is  resting, 
his  eyes  closed.  They  think  he  sleeps.  But  no, 
the  little  Dauphin  is  not  asleep.  He  turns  to  his 
mother,  and  seeing  her  tears,  he  says  to  her :  — 

"  Madame  la  reine,  why  do  you  weep  ?  Do  you 
really  think  I  am  going  to  die  ?  " 

The  queen  tries  to  answer.  Sobs  prevent  her 
from  speaking. 

"Do  not  weep,  Madame  la  reine ;  you  forget 
that  I  am  the  Dauphin,  and  that  Dauphins  can- 
not die  in  this  way." 

The  queen  sobs  more  than  ever,  and  the  little 
Dauphin  begins  to  be  frightened. 

"  Hola !  "  he  said,  "  I  will  not  let  Death  take 
me ;  I  will  find  a  way  to  keep  him  out.  Send, 
at  once,  for  forty  of  my  soldiers,  the  strongest 
men ;  let  them  mount  guard  around  my  bed.  Let 
a  hundred  cannon  be  ready,  day  and  night,  with 
lighted  matches,  beneath  my  windows,  and  sorrow 
to  Death  if  then  he  dare  approach  me !  " 

To  please  the  royal  child  the  queen  made  signs. 
Cannon  were  heard  to  roll  into  the  courtyard,  and 
the  forty  tallest  soldiers,  halberds  in  hand,  stood 
ranged  around  the  room.  They  were  all  old  vet- 
erans, with  gray  moustaches.  The  Dauphin  clapped 
his  hands  on  seeing  them.  One  he  recognized, 
and  called  to  him :  — 

"Lorrain  !  Lorrain  !  " 

The  soldier  advanced  toward  the  bed. 

"  I  love  you,  my  old  Lorrain.  Show  me  your 
big  sabre.  If  Death  comes  here  to  take  me,  you 
must  kill  him  —  won't  you?" 


Prose  Ballads.  99 

Lorrain  replied :  — 

"  Yes,  monseigneur." 

But  two  big  tears  rolled  down  his  weather- 
beaten  cheeks. 

At  this  moment  the  chaplain  approached  the 
little  Dauphin,  and  spoke  to  him  in  a  low  voice, 
showing  him  a  crucifix.  The  little  Dauphin  listened 
with  a  surprised  air ;  then,  suddenly  interrupting 
the  priest,  he  said :  — 

"  I  understand  very  well  what  you  are  saying, 
Monsieur  Vabbt ;  but,  after  all,  could  not  my  little 
friend  Beppo  die  in  my  place  if  I  gave  him  plenty 
of  money?  " 

The  chaplain  continued  to  speak  in  a  low  voice, 
and  the  little  Dauphin  seemed  more  and  more 
astonished. 

When  the  chaplain  had  finished,  the  little  Dau- 
phin said,  with  a  heavy  sigh :  — 

"  All  that  you  tell  me  is  very  sad,  Monsieur  Vabbty 
but  one  thing  comforts  me ;  it  is  that  up  there,  in 
the  paradise  of  stars,  I  shall  still  be  the  Dauphin. 
I  know  that  the  Good  God  is  my  cousin,  and  he 
will  not  fail  to  treat  me  according  to  my  rank." 

Then  he  added,  turning  to  his  mother :  — 

"  Tell  them  to  bring  me  my  finest  clothes,  my 
ermine  mantle,  and  my  velvet  shoes.  I  wish  to 
make  myself  gorgeous  for  the  angels  and  to  enter 
paradise  as  the  Dauphin  should." 

Again,  for  the  third  time,  the  chaplain  leaned 
down  to  the  little  Dauphin  and  spoke  to  him  in  a 
low  voice.  Suddenly,  in  the  middle  of  his  discourse 
the  royal  child  interrupted  him  angrily :  — 


ioo  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

"  Then  to  be  Dauphin,"  he  cried,  "  is  just  noth- 
ing at  all !  " 

And  —  not  willing  to  hear  another  word  —  the 
little  Dauphin  turned  his  face  to  the  wall  and  wept 
bitterly. 


II. 

THE  SUB-PREFECT  IN  THE  FIELDS. 

THE  sub-prefect  is  on  his  rounds.  Coachman 
before,  footman  behind,  the  caleche  of  the  sub- 
prefecture  bears  him  majestically  to  the  district 
assembly  of  Combe-aux-Fe"es.  For  this  memo- 
rable journey  the  sub-prefect  has  put  on  his  fine 
embroidered  coat,  his  little  opera-hat,  his  tight 
breeches  that  are  silver-striped,  and  his  gala  sword 
with  a  mother-of-pearl  handle.  On  his  knees  re- 
poses a  great  portfolio  of  crinkled  leather,  at  which 
he  gazes  sadly. 

The  sub-prefect  gazes  sadly  at  his  leather  case ; 
he  thinks  of  the  famous  speech  he  is  about  to  de- 
liver before  the  inhabitants  of  Combe-aux-Fe'es :  — 
"  Messieurs,  and  dear  constituents  —  " 
But  in  vain  does  he  twist  the  silk  of  his  blond 
moustache  and  repeat  a  score  of  times :  — 
"  Messieurs,  and  dear  constituents  —  " 
Not  another  word  will  come.     It  is  so  hot  in 
that  caleche.     The  high-road  to  Combe-aux-Fe'es 
stretches  dustily  as  far  as  eye  can  reach  beneath 
that  Southern  sun.     The  air  is  like  a  furnace ;  on 
the  elms,  white  with  dust,  that  line  the  road,  thou- 


Prose  Ballads.  101 

sands  of  grasshoppers  are  discoursing  shrilly  from 
one  tree  to  another.  Suddenly  the  sub-prefect 
quivers.  Over  there,  at  the  foot  of  a  slope,  he 
perceives  a  little  wood  of  live-oaks  which  seems  to 
be  making  him  a  sign. 

The  little  wood  of  live-oaks  seems  to  be  making 
him  a  sign :  — 

"  Come  this  way,  monsieur,  come  this  way  to 
compose  your  speech;  you  will  be  much  more 
comfortable  under  my  trees." 

The  sub-prefect  is  persuaded.  He  jumps  from 
his  caleche  and  tells  his  servants  to  wait  for  him ; 
he  is  going  to  compose  his  speech  in  the  little 
wood  of  live-oaks. 

In  the  little  wood  of  live-oaks  there  are  birds 
and  violets,  and  brooks  purling  through  the  turf. 
When  the  birds  caught  sight  of  the  prefect  in  his 
handsome  breeches  carrying  his  leather  case  they 
were  frightened  and  stopped  singing,  the  brooks 
dared  not  purl,  and  the  violets  hid  in  the  grass. 
All  that  little  world  had  never  seen  a  sub-prefect, 
and  they  asked  one  another  in  whispers  who  the 
grand  gentleman  could  be  who  walked  about  in 
silver-laced  breeches. 

Whispering  beneath  the  leafage,  they  asked  one 
another  who  that  grand  gentleman  in  the  silver- 
laced  breeches  could  be.  During  this  time  the 
sub-prefect,  delighted  with  the  silence  and  the 
coolness  of  the  wood,  lifted  the  tails  of  his  coat, 
laid  his  opera-hat  on  the  grass,  and  sat  himself 
down  in  the  moss  at  the  foot  of  a  fine  young  live- 
oak.  Then  he  opened  his  leather  portfolio  and 


102  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

took  therefrom  a  very  large  sheet  of  ministerial 
paper. 

"  He  is  an  artist,"  said  a  redwing. 

"  No,"  said  a  bullfinch,  "  he  is  not  an  artist  be- 
cause he  wears  silvered  breeches ;  he  is  a  prince." 

"  Neither  prince  nor  artist,"  interrupted  an  old 
nightingale  who  had  sung  in  the  gardens  of  the 
sub-prefecture  for  one  whole  season.  "  I  know 
who  he  is  —  he  is  a  sub-prefect." 

And  all  the  little  wood  began  to  whisper  and 
murmur :  — 

"  He  's  a  sub-prefect !  he  's  a  sub-prefect !  " 

"  How  bald  he  is ! "  observed  a  lark  with  a  big 
tuft. 

The  violets  asked :  — 

"Is  he  cross?" 

"  Is  he  cross?"  asked  the  violets. 

The  nightingale  answered :  — 

"  Not  at  all." 

On  this  assurance  the  birds  began  to  sing,  the 
brooks  to  purl,  the  violets  to  exhale  their  fragrance 
just  as  if  the  monsieur  were  not  there. 

Impassible  in  the  midst  of  the  pretty  racket, 
the  sub-prefect  sat  invoking  in  his  heart  the 
Muse  of  agricultural  comitias,  and  he  presently 
began,  with  pencil  uplifted,  to  declaim  his  speech 
in  his  voice  of  ceremony. 

"  Messieurs,  and  dear  constituents  —  " 

"  Messieurs,  and  dear  constituents,"  said  the  sub* 
prefect,  in  his  voice  of  ceremony. 

A  burst  of  laughter  interrupted  him ;  he  turned 
round  and  saw  nothing  but  a  green  woodpecker, 


Prose  Ballads.  103 

perched  on  his  opera-hat,  which  looked  at  him 
smiling.  The  sub-prefect  shrugged  his  shoulders, 
and  attempted  to  resume  his  speech;  but  the 
woodpecker  stopped  him  again,  crying  out :  — 

"What's  the  good?" 

"  What  is  the  good  ?  "  said  the  sub-prefect,  be- 
coming very  red.  Then  waving  away  with  a 
gesture  that  insolent  beast,  he  began  once 
more :  — 

"  Messieurs,  and  dear  constituents  —  " 

"  Messieurs,  and  dear  constituents,"  resumed  the 
sub-prefect. 

But  just  then,  all  the  little  violets  raised  their 
heads  to  the  tops  of  their  stalks  and  said  to  him 
softly :  — 

"  Monsieur,  do  smell  how  good  we  smell." 

And  the  brooks  purled  a  music  divine  in  the 
mosses ;  and  above,  in  the  branches  over  his  head, 
the  red-throated  warblers  were  singing  their  pretti- 
est tunes,  as  if  the  whole  little  wood  had  conspired 
to  prevent  him  from  composing  his  speech. 

Yes,  the  whole  little  wood  had  conspired  to 
prevent  him  from  composing  his  speech.  The 
sub-prefect,  tipsy  with  perfume  and  drunk  with 
music,  tried  in  vain  to  resist  the  new  spell  that 
seized  him.  He  leaned  his  elbows  on  the  grass, 
unbuttoned  his  fine  lace  coat,  and  stammered  again 
two  or  three  times  :  — 

"  Messieurs,  and  dear  —  " 

Then  he  sent  his  dear  constituents  to  the  devil, 
and  the  Muse  of  agricultural  comitias  was  forced 
to  veil  her  face. 


IO4  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

Veil  thy  face,  O  Muse  of  agricultural  comitias ! 
When  at  the  end  of  an  hour  the  servants  of  the 
sub-prefecture,  uneasy  about  their  master,  entered 
the  little  wood,  they  saw  a  sight  that  caused  them 
to  recoil  with  horror.  The  sub-prefect  was  lying 
on  his  stomach  in  the  grass,  his  clothes  loose,  his 
coat  off,  as  disorderly  as  a  bohemian,  and  —  all 
the  while  chewing  violets  —  he,  the  sub-prefect, 
was  writing  poetry ! 


Bixiou  s  Portfolio.  105 


BIXIOU'S  PORTFOLIO. 

ONE  morning  in  the  month  of  October,  a  few 
days  before  leaving  Paris,  a  man  entered  my  room 
while  I  was  at  breakfast,  an  old  man  in  a  shabby, 
muddy  coat,  his  spine  bent,  and  trembling  on  his 
long  legs  like  an  unfledged  heron.  This  was 
Bixiou.  Yes,  Parisians,  your  Bixiou,  the  malicious, 
fascinating  Bixiou,  —  that  frantic  jester,  who  de- 
lighted you  for  fifteen  years  with  his  pamphlets  and 
his  caricatures.  Ah  !  the  poor  fellow,  what  distress  ! 
Were  it  not  for  a  grimace  he  made  as  he  entered 
the  room  I  should  never  have  recognized  him. 

With  his  head  bent  sideways  to  his  shoulder,  a 
cane  at  his  teeth  like  a  flute,  the  illustrious  and 
lugubrious  jester  advanced  to  the  middle  of  the 
room,  striking  against  my  table,  and  saying  in  a 
doleful  voice:  — 

"  Have  pity  on  a  poor  blind  man  !  " 

The  mimicry  was  so  good  that  I  could  not  help 
laughing.  But  he,  very  coldly :  — 

"  You  think  I  am  joking  —  look !  " 

And  he  turned  to  me  a  pair  of  white  eyes, 
sightless. 

"  I  am  blind,  my  dear  fellow,  blind  for  life. 
That  is  what  comes  of  writing  with  vitriol.  I 
have  burned  out  my  eyes  at  that  pretty  trade; 


io6  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

yes,  burned  them  to  the  socket  —  to  the 
bobhhes ! "  he  added,  showing  me  his  calcined 
eyelids,  in  which  not  the  vestige  of  a  lash  re- 
mained. 

I  was  so  moved  that  I  could  not  speak  to  him. 
My  silence  made  him  uneasy. 

"  Are  you  at  work?" 

"  No,  Bixiou,  I  am  at  breakfast.  Will  you  have 
some?" 

He  did  not  answer,  but  by  the  quivering  of  his 
nostrils  I  saw  his  desire  to  accept.  I  took  him  by 
the  hand  and  seated  him  beside  me. 

While  they  served  him,  the  poor  devil  breathed 
in,  as  it  were,  the  food  with  a  laugh. 

"  It  smells  good,  all  that.  I  shall  feast  well ;  it  is 
so  long  since  I  gave  up  breakfasting.  A  two-sous 
loaf  every  morning  while  I  haunt  the  ministries, — 
for  you  know  I  haunt  the  ministries  now-a-days ; 
that 's  my  only  profession.  I  am  trying  to  hook 
a  tobacco  license.  You  are  shocked,  but  what  am 
I  to  do  ?  They  must  have  food  at  home.  I  can't 
design  any  longer;  I  can't  write.  Dictate?  But 
what?  I  have  nothing  in  my  head  now;  I  can't 
invent.  My  business  was  to  see  the  grimaces  of 
Paris  and  show  them  up,  and  I  can't  do  that  any 
longer.  So  I  bethought  me  of  a  tobacco  license  — 
not  on  the  boulevards,  you  understand.  I  have 
no  claim  to  that  favour,  not  being  the  mother  of 
a  danseuse,  nor  the  widow  of  an  officer.  No, 
simply  some  little  provincial  tobacco  office,  far 
away,  in  a  corner  of  the  Vosges.  There  I  shall 
set  up  a  big  porcelain  pipe  and  call  myself  Hans 


Bixious  Portfolio.  107 

or  Ze"be"de",  as  in  Erckmann-Chatrian,  and  I  shall 
console  myself  for  not  writing  any  longer  by  mak- 
ing cornucopias  for  snuff  out  of  the  works  of  my 
contemporaries. 

"That  is  all  I  ask  for.  Not  much,  is  it?  Well, 
it  is  the  devil  and  all  to  get  it.  And  yet  I  ought 
not  to  be  without  influence.  Think  how  I  used 
to  be  in  the  thick  of  everything !  I  dined  with 
the  marshal,  and  the  prince,  and  the  ministers ;  all 
those  people  wanted  me  because  I  amused  them, 
or  else  because  they  were  afraid  of  me.  Now,  I 
can't  make  any  one  afraid.  Oh,  my  eyes  !  my  poor 
eyes !  No  one  invites  me  now.  It  is  too  dismal 
to  have  a  blind  head  at  table.  Pass  me  the  bread, 
if  you  please.  Ah  !  those  bandits ;  they  are  mak- 
ing me  pay  dear  for  that  wretched  tobacco  license. 
For  six  months  I  have  lobbied  the  ministries  with 
my  petition.  I  get  there  every  morning  when  the 
servants  are  lighting  the  fires  and  exercising  their 
Excellencies'  horses  in  the  courtyards,  and  I  don't 
leave  till  night,  when  the  lamps  are  brought  in  and  the 
kitchens  begin  to  smell  good.  My  whole  life  is  spent 
on  the  wooden  chests  of  antechambers.  The  ushers 
know  me  well,  I  can  tell  you !  At  the  Interior 
they  call  me  '  That  kind  monsieur !  '  because, 
to  get  their  good  word,  I  make  puns  or  sketch 
them  some  of  the  big-wigs  on  a  corner  of  their 
tablets,  which  makes  them  laugh.  That's  what  I've 
come  to  after  twenty  years  of  rollicking  successes  ! 
that's  the  end  of  an  artist's  life.  And  to  think 
that  there  are  forty  thousand  young  rascals  in 
France  whose  very  mouths  water  to  take  up  that 


io8  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

profession  !  To  think  that  every  day  in  the  prov- 
inces a  locomotive  gets  up  steam  to  bring  batches 
of  imbeciles  hungry  for  literature  and  printed  rub- 
bish to  Paris  !  Ah  !  deluded  provinces,  if  Bixiou's 
miserable  fate  could  only  teach  you  a  lesson !  " 

So  saying,  he  dropped  his  nose  into  his  plate  and 
began  to  eat  with  avidity,  without  another  word. 
It  was  piteous  to  see  him.  Every  second  he 
lost  his  bread,  his  fork,  and  felt  about  for  his 
glass.  Poor  man  !  he  had  not  yet  got  the  habit  of 
blindness. 

After  a  while,  he  resumed :  — 

"  Do  you  know  what  is  most  horrible  of  all  to 
me?  It  is  that  I  can  no  longer  read  the  papers. 
You  have  to  belong  to  the  newspaper  business  to 
understand  that.  Sometimes,  in  the  evening  when 
I  go  home  I  buy  one,  only  to  smell  that  odour  of 
damp  paper  and  fresh  news.  It  is  so  good !  but 
there  's  no  one  to  read  it  to  me.  My  wife  might, 
but  she  won't ;  she  pretends  that  in  the  '  diverse 
facts '  there  is  so  much  that  is  improper.  Ha ! 
those  former  mistresses !  once  married,  there  are 
none  more  prudish  than  they.  Ever  since  I  made 
her  Madame  Bixiou  she  thinks  herself  bound  to 
be  a  bigot  —  and  to  such  a  point !  Did  n't  she 
want  to  have  me  wash  my  eyes  with  water  from 
the  Salette?  and  then,  holy  bread,  and  holy  water, 
and  collections,  and  Foundlings  and  Chinese  orphans 
and  I  don't  know  what  all.  We  are  in  good  works 
up  to  our  chin.  /  think  it  would  be  a  good  work 
to  read  me  my  newspaper,  but  no,  she  won't.  If 


Bixious  Portfolio.  109 

my  daughter  were  at  home  she  would  read  it  to 
me,  but  after  I  became  blind  I  sent  her  to  Notre- 
Dame-des-Arts,  to  have  one  less  mouth  to  feed. 
She 's  another  who  gives  me  comfort !  not  nine 
years  in  the  world,  and  she  has  had  every  known 
disease !  And  sad !  and  ugly !  uglier  than  I,  if 
that 's  possible  —  a  fright !  Well,  I  never  could 
make  anything  but  caricatures,  and  she  is  one  of 
them  —  Ah  ca !  I'm  a  fine  fellow  to  be  telling 
you  my  family  histories.  What  are  they  to  you? 
Come,  give  me  a  little  more  of  that  brandy. 
I  must  brace  myself  up ;  I  am  going  from  here  to 
the  ministry  of  Public  Instruction,  and  the  ushers 
there  are  not  so  easy  as  some  to  amuse  —  they  are 
all  retired  professors." 

I  poured  him  out  his  brandy.  He  began  to 
drink  it  with  little  sips  and  a  gentler  air.  Pres- 
ently I  don't  know  what  fancy  took  him,  but  he 
rose,  glass  in  hand,  turned  on  all  sides  that  head 
of  a  blind  adder,  with  the  cajoling  smile  of  a  man 
about  to  speak,  and  said,  in  a  strident  voice,  as  if 
haranguing  a  banquet  of  two  hundred  guests :  — 

"  To  Art !     To  Letters  !     To  the  Press  !  " 

And  thereupon  he  launched  into  a  ten  minutes' 
speech,  the  craziest,  most  marvellous  improvisation 
which  ever  issued  from  that  satirical  brain. 

Imagine  a  review  of  events  at  the  end  of  a  year, 
entitled,  "The  Bohemia  of  Letters  in  18-"  — 
our  so  called  literary  meetings,  our  disquisitions, 
our  quarrels,  all  the  absurdities  of  an  eccentric 
society,  a  sewer  of  ink,  hell  without  grandeur, 
where  the  denizens  throttle,  and  gut,  and  rob  one 


no  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

another,  and  talk  interest  and  sous  (far  more  than 
they  do  among  the  bourgeois),  which  does  not 
hinder  many  from  dying  of  hunger — in  short,  an 
epitome  of  all  our  meanness,  all  our  paltriness;  old 
Baron  T.  .  .  of  the  Tombola  going  about  saying 
"  gna,  gna,  gna  "  in  the  Tuileries  gardens  with  his 
wooden  bowl  and  his  bottle-blue  coat;  together 
with  the  deaths  of  the  year,  the  burials  pro  tern., 
the  funeral  orations,  always  the  same  "  dear  and 
regretted  "  over  a  poor  devil  whose  grave  no  one 
will  pay  for ;  and  the  suicides,  and  those  who  have 
gone  mad  —  imagine  all  that  related,  detailed, 
gesticulated,  by  a  humourist  of  genius,  and  you 
will  have  an  idea  of  Bixiou's  improvisation. 

His  speech  ended  and  the  brandy  drunk,  he 
asked  me  what  time  it  was  and  went  away  without 
bidding  me  good-bye.  I  don't  know  what  the 
ushers  of  M.  Duruy  thought  of  his  visit  that  morn- 
ing, but  I  know  that  never  in  all  my  life  did  I  feel 
more  sad  or  so  ill  at  ease  for  the  work  of  the  day 
as  I  did  that  morning  after  the  departure  of  my 
terrible  visitor.  My  inkstand  sickened  me,  my 
pen  was  a  horror  to  me.  I  wanted  to  rush  away, 
afar,  to  see  trees,  to  smell  something  good.  What 
hatred,  great  God !  what  gall !  what  a  need  to 
slaver  all  things  !  to  soil  all  things  !  Ah  !  the  mis- 
erable man ! 

I  paced  up  and  down  my  room  in  a  fury,  fancy- 
ing I  still  heard  the  sneer  of  disgust  with  which  he 
had  spoken  of  his  daughter. 

Suddenly,  near  the  chair  where  the  blind  man 


Bixious  Portfolio.  1 1 1 

had  been  sitting,  I  felt  something  touch  my  foot. 
Stooping  I  saw  his  portfolio,  a  big,  shiny  wallet 
with  broken  edges,  which  never  left  him,  and 
which  he  called  in  jest  his  "venom  pocket."  That 
pocket  was  as  renowned  among  us  as  the  famous 
boxes  of  M.  de  Girardin.  It  was  said  there  were 
terrible  things  within  it.  The  opportunity  now 
offered  itself  to  ascertain  if  this  were  so.  In  fall- 
ing, the  old  portfolio,  stuffed  too  full,  had  burst, 
and  the  papers  lay  scattered  on  the  carpet.  I 
was  forced  to  pick  them  up,  one  by  one ;  and  so 
doing  I  saw :  — 

A  number  of  letters,  written  on  flowered  paper, 
all  beginning :  "  My  dear  papa,"  and  signed  Celine 
Bixiou  of  the  Children  of  Marie. 

Old  prescriptions  for  children's  ailments ;  croup, 
convulsions,  scarlatina,  measles ;  the  poor  little 
thing  had  not  been  spared  a  single  one. 

Finally,  from  a  large  sealed  envelope,  a  few 
strands  of  yellow  curly  hair  were  escaping,  and  on 
the  paper  was  written,  in  big,  straggling  writing, 
the  writing  of  a  blind  man  :  — 

"Celine's  hair,  cut  off  May  1 3th;  the  day 
she  entered  over  there." 

That  is  what  there  was  in  Bixiou's  portfolio. 

Ah,  Parisians,  you  are  all  alike.  Disgust,  sar- 
casm, infernal  laughter,  ferocious  jeers,  and  then — • 
Celine's  hair,  cut  off  May 


H2  Letters  from  My  Mill. 


THE    LEGEND    OF    THE    MAN    WITH    THE 
GOLDEN    BRAIN. 

TO  THE  LADY  WHO  ASKS   FOR  GAY   STORIES. 

ON  reading  your  letter,  madame,  I  felt  some- 
thing like  remorse.  I  blamed  myself  for  the  half- 
mourning  colour  of  my  tales,  and  I  resolved  to 
offer  you  to-day  something  joyous,  even  wildly 
joyous. 

Why  should  I  be  sad,  after  all?  I  am  living  a 
thousand  leagues  from  Parisian  fogs,  on  a  luminous 
hill,  in  a  land  of  tambourines  and  muscat  wine. 
Around  me  is  nought  but  sun  and  music ;  I  have 
orchestras  of  finches,  choral  societies  of  torn-tits ; 
in  the  morning,  curlews  are  saying :  Coureli !  cou- 
reli !  at  midday  come  the  cicadas ;  and  then  the 
shepherds  playing  their  fifes,  and  the  pretty  young 
brunettes  laughing  among  the  vines.  In  truth, 
this  place  is  ill-chosen  to  rub-in  black.  I  ought 
rather  to  send  to  a  lady  rose-coloured  poems  and 
tales  of  gallantry. 

But,  no !  I  am  still  too  near  Paris.  Every  day 
that  city  sends  me,  even  among  my  pines,  spatter- 
ings  of  her  sadness.  At  the  moment  when  I  write 
these  lines,  the  news  reaches  me  of  poor  Charles 
Barbara's  miserable  death,  and  my  mill  is  a  place 
of  mourning.  Adieu,  curlews  and  cicadas !  I  have 


The  Man  with  the  Golden  Brain.     1 1 3 

no  heart  now  for  gayety.  This  is  why,  madame, 
instead  of  the  lively,  jesting  story  that  I  meant  to 
write  for  you,  you  must  accept  to-day  one  more 
melancholy  legend. 

There  was  once  a  man  with  a  golden  brain ;  yes, 
madame,  a  brain  all  golden.  When  he  came  into 
the  world  the  doctors  thought  that  the  babe  could 
not  live,  so  heavy  was  his  head  and  his  cranium  so 
developed.  He  did  live,  however,  and  he  grew  in 
the  sun  like  a  beautiful  olive-tree.  But  his  big 
head  dragged  him  about,  and  it  was  pitiable  to  see 
how  he  knocked  against  the  furniture  as  he  went 
along.  He  often  fell.  Once  he  rolled  from  the 
top  of  a  portico  and  struck  his  forehead  on  the 
marble  steps,  and  his  skull  rang  like  an  ingot  of 
metal.  They  thought  him  dead ;  but,  on  picking 
him  up,  only  a  slight  wound  was  found,  out  of 
which  two  or  three  tiny  drops  of  gold  oozed  into 
his  hair.  This  was  how  his  parents  first  knew  that 
his  brain  was  gold. 

The  thing  was  kept  secret.  The  poor  little  fel- 
low himself  did  not  know  it.  Now  and  then  he 
would  ask  why  they  no  longer  let  him  run  out  to 
play  with  the  children  in  the  street. 

"  They  would  steal  you,  my  dear  treasure,"  re- 
plied his  mother. 

That  gave  the  little  one  a  great  fear  of  being 
stolen.  He  played  alone,  and  said  no  more ;  stag- 
gering heavily  from  one  room  to  another. 

When  he  was  eighteen  years  of  age  his  parents 
first  revealed  to  him  the  abnormal  gift  he  had 

8 


114  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

received  from  fate ;  and  as  they  had  brought  him 
up  and  fed  him  until  that  day,  they  asked  him,  in 
return,  for  a  little  of  his  gold.  The  lad  did  not 
hesitate.  Instantly  —  how,  or  by  what  means,  the 
legend  does  not  say  —  he  tore  from  his  brain  a 
morsel  of  massive  gold,  a  piece  as  big  as  a  nut, 
and  proudly  flung  it  on  his  mother's  lap.  Then, 
quite  dazzled  by  the  thought  of  the  riches  he 
carried  in  his  brain,  mad  with  desires,  drunk  with 
his  power,  he  quitted  his  father's  house  and  went 
out  into  the  world,  squandering  his  treasure. 

At  the  pace  he  led  his  life,  in  royal  fashion,  sow- 
ing gold  without  counting  it,  one  would  have 
thought  that  his  brain  was  inexhaustible.  It  did 
exhaust  itself,  however,  and  by  degrees  his  eyes 
grew  dim,  his  cheeks  hollow.  At  last,  one  morn- 
ing after  a  wild  debauch,  the  unfortunate  fellow, 
left  alone  amid  the  fragments  of  the  feast  and  the 
lamps  that  were  paling,  was  horrified  at  the  enor- 
mous breach  he  had  made  in  his  ingots.  It  was 
time  to  stop. 

Henceforth,  a  new  existence.  The  man  with 
the  golden  brain  went  away,  to  live  apart,  by  the 
work  of  his  hands ;  suspicious  and  timid  as  a 
miser,  fleeing  from  temptation,  striving  to  forget, 
himself,  the  fatal  riches  which  he  desired  never 
to  touch  again.  Unfortunately,  a  friend  followed 
him  into  his  solitude;  and  that  friend  knew  his 
secret. 

One  night  the  poor  man  was  awakened  by  a  pain 
in  his  head,  a  dreadful  pain ;  he  sprang  up  terri- 


The  Man  with  the  Golden  Brain.     115 

fied,  and  saw,  in  a  moon  ray,  his  friend  hastily  de- 
parting and  hiding  something  beneath  his  cloak. 

A  piece  of  his  brain  which  was  stolen  from  him  ! 

Some  time  later,  the  man  with  the  golden  brain 
fell  in  love.  This  time  all  was  over  with  him. 
He  loved  with  the  best  of  his  soul  a  fair-haired 
little  woman,  who  loved  him  in  return,  but  never- 
theless preferred  bow-knots  and  feathers  and  pretty 
bronze  tassels  to  her  boots. 

Between  the  fingers  of  this  dainty  creature,  half 
bird,  half  doll,  the  gold  slipped  gayly  away.  She 
had  all  the  caprices;  he  never  could  say  her 
nay ;  for  fear  of  troubling  her,  he  never  told  her 
to  the  last  about  the  melancholy  source  of  his 
fortune. 

"  We  must  be  very  rich,"  she  would  say. 

And  the  poor  fellow  answered :  — 

"  Oh,  yes  !  very  rich  indeed  !  " 

And  so  saying  he  smiled  with  love  at  the  little 
fairy  bird  that  was  eating  his  brain  out  innocently. 
Sometimes,  however,  fears  took  possession  of  him ; 
he  longed  to  become  a  miser ;  but  then  the  little 
woman  would  come  to  him,  skipping,  and  say : 

"  My  husband,  you  are  so  rich,  buy  me  some- 
thing that  is  very  costly." 

And  he  bought  her  something  that  was  very 
costly. 

This  lasted  two  years ;  then,  one  morning,  the 
little  woman  died,  no  one  knew  why,  like  a  bird. 
The  gold  was  almost  at  an  end,  and  with  what  re- 
mained of  it  the  widower  gave  his  dear  lost  love  a 
fine  interment.  Bells  all  ringing,  mourning  coaches 


u6  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

draped  with  black,  horses  caparisoned,  silver  tears 
upon  the  velvet,  and  great  black  plumes  upon  their 
heads.  Nothing  seemed  to  him  too  magnificent. 
What  was  his  gold  to  him  now?  He  gave  it  to  the 
church,  to  the  bearers,  to  those  who  sold  the  im- 
mortelles; he  gave  it  to  every  one,  without  a  ques- 
tion. So,  on  leaving  the  cemetery,  almost  nothing 
remained  to  him  of  that  marvellous  brain,  except  a 
few  atoms  in  the  corners  of  the  cranium. 

Then  he  was  seen  to  go  away  through  the 
streets,  with  a  wild  look,  his  hands  held  out  be- 
fore him,  stumbling  along  like  a  drunken  man. 
At  night,  when  the  arcades  were  brilliant,  he 
stopped  before  a  large  show-window  in  which  a 
mass  of  stuffs  and  adornments  glittered  under  the 
gaslight,  and* fixing  his  eyes  on  two  pairs  of  blue 
satin  slippers  lined  with  swan's-down,  "  I  wonder 
which  she  would  like  best,"  he  said  to  himself, 
smiling.  Then,  forgetting  already  that  the  little 
wife  was  dead,  he  entered  to  buy  them. 

At  the  farther  end  of  the  shop  the  owner  heard 
a  loud  cry ;  rushing  forward  she  recoiled  with  fear 
on  seeing  a  tall  man  leaning  on  the  counter  and 
gazing  at  her  stupefied.  In  one  hand  he  was  hold- 
ing a  pair  of  blue  slippers  lined  with  swan's-down ; 
the  other  he  held  out  to  her,  all  cut  and  bleeding, 
with  fragments  of  gold  at  the  tips  of  the  nails. 

That,  madame,  is  the  legend  of  the  man  with  the 
golden  brain. 

In  spite  of  its  fantastic  air,  this  legend  is  true 
from  beginning  to  end.  There  are  in  this  world 


The  Man  with  the  Golden  Brain.     1 1 7 

poor  fellows  who  are  compelled  to  live  by  their 
brains,  and  to  pay  in  the  fine  gold  of  their  marrow 
and  substance  for  the  smallest  things  of  life.  It  is 
their  daily  martyrdom ;  and  when  they  are  weary 
of  suffering  — 


n8  Letters  from  My  Mill. 


THE  POET  MISTRAL. 

LAST  Sunday,  on  rising,  I  fancied  I  had  waked 
in  the  rue  du  Faubourg-Montmartre.  It  rained, 
the  sky  was  gray,  the  mill  melancholy.  I  was  afraid 
to  spend  that  cold,  rainy  day  at  home,  and  suddenly 
a  desire  came  to  me  to  go  and  warm  myself  up  be- 
side Frederic  Mistral,  that  great  poet,  who  lives 
three  leagues  away  from  my  pines  in  his  little 
village  of  Maillane. 

No  sooner  thought  than  gone;  a  myrtle-wood 
stick,  my  Montaigne,  a  wrap,  and  I  am  off! 

No  one  in  the  fields.  Our  noble  Catholic  Pro- 
vence leaves  the  earth  to  rest  on  Sundays.  The 
farmhouses  are  closed,  the  dogs  are  alone  in  the 
yards.  Now  and  then  I  meet  the  waggon  of  a  car- 
rier with  its  streaming  hood,  or  an  old  woman 
wrapped  in  her  mantle,  colour  of  dead  leaves,  or 
mules  in  their  gala  trappings,  saddle-cloths  of  blue 
and  white  matweed,  scarlet  pompons  and  silver 
bells,  drawing  at  a  trot  a  carriole  of  the  farm  hands 
going  to  mass ;  and  away  over  there,  through  the 
fog,  I  see  a  boat  on  the  pond  and  a  fisherman 
standing  to  cast  his  net. 

No  possibility  of  reading  on  the  way.  The  rain 
is  falling  in  torrents  and  the  tramontana  is  dashing 
it  in  bucketfuls  on  my  face.  I  do  the  way  at  a 


Frederic  Mistral. 


>m   my 


•    iSgg .  by 


The  Poet  Mistral.  119 

rush ;  and  after  a  walk  of  three  hours  I  see  before 
me  the  little  cypress  wood  in  the  middle  of  which 
Maillane  shelters  itself  in  dread  of  the  wind. 

Not  a  cat  in  the  village  streets ;  everybody  is  at 
high-mass.  As  I  pass  before  the  church  the  trom- 
bones are  snorting  and  I  see  the  lighted  candles 
through  the  panes  of  coloured  glass. 

The  poet's  house  is  at  the  extreme  end  of  the 
village,  the  last  house  to  the  left  on  the  road  to 
Saint- Remy,  —  a  tiny  house  of  one  storey  with  a 
garden  in  front.  I  enter  softly.  No  one !  The 
door  of  the  salon  is  closed,  but  I  hear  behind  it 
some  one  who  is  walking  about  and  talking.  The 
voice  and  step  are  known  to  me.  I  stop  a  moment 
in  the  little  whitewashed  passage,  my  hand  on  the 
button  of  the  door,  quite  agitated.  My  heart  is 
beating.  He  is  there.  At  work.  Must  I  wait  till  the 
strophe  is  composed  ?  I'  faith,  no.  I  will  enter. 

Ah !  Parisians,  when  the  poet  of  Maillane  went 
to  you  to  show  Paris  to  his  Mireille,  and  you  saw 
him  in  your  salons,  that  Chactas  in  a  dress  coat, 
a  stiff  collar,  and  the  tall  hat  which  hampered  him, 
as  did  his  fame,  you  thought  that  was  Mistral. 
No,  it  was  not  he.  There  is  but  one  Mistral  in 
the  world,  he  whom  I  surprised  last  Sunday  in  his 
village  with  a  felt  hat  on  one  ear,  a  jacket,  no 
waistcoat,  a  red  Catalan  waistband  round  his  loins, 
his  eye  blazing,  the  fire  of  inspiration  on  his 
cheek-bones,  superb,  with  a  kind  smile,  graceful 
as  a  Greek  shepherd,  and  walking  up  and  down, 
his  hands  in  his  pockets,  making  poetry. 


1 20  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

"What?  is  it  you?"  cried  Mistral,  springing  to 
embrace  me.  "  What  a  good  idea  of  yours  to  come  ! 
This  is  the  fete  day  of  Maillane.  We  have  a  band 
from  Avignon,  bulls,  a  procession,  the  farandole  ; 
it  will  all  be  magnificent.  My  mother  will  soon  be 
home  from  mass ;  we  shall  have  breakfast,  and  then, 
zou  !  we  '11  go  and  see  the  pretty  girls  dance." 

While  he  spoke,  I  looked  with  emotion  at  the 
little  salon  hung  in  light  colours,  which  I  had  not 
seen  for  a  long  time,  but  where  I  had  passed  so 
many  glorious  hours.  Nothing  was  changed.  Still 
the  same  sofa  with  yellow  squares,  the  two  arm- 
chairs of  straw,  the  Venus  without  arms,  the 
Venus  of  Aries  on  the  mantel,  the  portrait  of  the 
poet  by  Hebert,  his  photograph  by  Etienne  Carjat 
and,  in  a  corner,  near  the  window,  the  desk  (a 
shabby  little  registration-clerk's  desk)  piled  with 
old  volumes  and  dictionaries.  At  the  centre  of 
the  desk  I  saw  a  large  open  manuscript.  This 
was  Calendal,  —  Mistral's  new  poem,  which  will 
appear  on  Christmas-day  of  the  present  year. 
This  poem,  Mistral  has  been  working  at  for  seven 
years,  and  it  is  now  six  months  since  he  wrote  the 
last  line  of  it;  but  he  dares  not  part  from  it  yet. 
You  understand,  there  is  always  a  verse  to  polish, 
a  rhyme  more  sonorous  to  find.  Though  Mistral 
composes  wholly  in  the  Provencal  language,  he 
writes  and  rewrites  his  lines  as  if  all  the  world 
could  read  them  in  their  own  tongue  and  do  jus- 
tice to  his  labour  as  a  good  workman.  Oh !  the 
noble  poet !  it  is  surely  of  Mistral  that  Montaigne 
might  have  said :  — 


T/te  Poet  Mistral.  121 

"  Do  you  remember  him  of  whom  it  was  asked 
why  he  took  such  trouble  about  an  art  which 
could  reach  the  knowledge  of  so  few  persons? 
*  The  few  are  enough  for  me/  he  answered.  '  One 
is  enough.  None  is  enough.'  " 

I  took  the  manuscript  of  Calendal  in  my  hand, 
and  I  turned  its  leaves  with  emotion.  Suddenly 
a  burst  of  fifes  and  tambourines  sounded  in  the 
street  beneath  the  windows,  and  behold,  my  Mis- 
tral rushing  to  his  closet,  bringing  out  glasses  and 
bottles,  dragging  the  table  to  the  middle  of  the 
salon,  and  opening  the  door  to  the  musicians,  say- 
ing to  me  as  he  did  so :  — 

"  Don't  laugh.  They  have  come  to  serenade  me. 
I  am  a  municipal  counsellor." 

The  little  room  became  crowded  with  people. 
They  laid  their  tambourines  on  the  chairs  and  put 
their  old  banner  in  a  corner.  Boiled  wine  cir- 
culated. Then,  when  several  bottles  had  been 
emptied  to  the  health  of  M.  Fre"de"ric  and  they 
had  gravely  conversed  together  about  the  festival 
—  would  the  farandole  be  as  fine  as  last  year? 
would  the  bulls  behave  properly?  —  the  musicians 
retired  to  go  and  greet  the  other  members  of  the 
Council  with  a  like  serenade.  At  this  moment 
Mistral's  mother  appeared. 

In  a  turn  of  the  hand  the  table  is  laid  with  a  fine 
white  cloth  and  two  places.  I  know  the  customs 
of  the  house.  I  know  that  when  Mistral  has  com- 
pany his  mother  never  sits  at  table.  The  poor 
old  woman  speaks  only  Provencal,  and  would  feel 


122  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

very  ill  at  her  ease  with  Frenchmen.  Besides,  she 
is  wanted  in  the  kitchen. 

Dieu  /  the  good  meal  I  made  that  morning :  a 
bit  of  roast  kid,  some  mountain  cheese,  grape  jelly, 
figs,  and  muscat  grapes.  The  whole  washed  down 
with  that  good  Chdteau-neuf  des  Papes  that  has  so 
fine  a  rosy  colour  in  the  glasses. 

At  dessert,  I  fetched  the  poem  and  laid  it  on 
the  table  before  Mistral. 

"  But  we  said  we  would  go  out,"  said  the  poet, 
smiling. 

"  No,  no  !     Calendal  /  Calendal !  " 

Mistral  resigned  himself,  and  in  his  soft  and 
musical  voice,  beating  time  to  his  lines  with  his 
hand,  he  sang  the  first  quatrain :  "  Of  a  girl  mad 
with  love,  —  I  have  told  the  sad  adventure,  —  and 
I  now  will  sing,  if  God  so  wills,  a  child  of  Cassis  — 
a  poor  little  sardine  fisher." 

Without,  the  bells  were  ringing  for  vespers,  the 
fire-crackers  burst  in  the  square,  the  fifes  and  the 
tambourines  marched  up  and  down,  and  the  bulls 
of  the  Camargue,  held  ready  for  the  race,  bellowed 
loudly. 

I,  my  elbows  on  the  cloth,  and  with  tears  in  my 
eyes,  I  listened  to  the  tale  of  the  little  Provencal 
fisher-lad. 

Calendal  was  only  a  fisher-lad ;  love  made  him 
a  hero.  To  win  the  heart  of  his  darling,  the  lovely 
Este>ella,  he  undertook  marvellous  things,  beside 
which  the  labours  of  Hercules,  those  twelve  labours, 
were  nothing. 


The  Poet  MistraL  123 

Once,  taking  a  notion  to  be  rich,  he  invented  a 
formidable  fishing-net,  and  with  it  he  brought  into 
port  all  the  fish  of  the  sea. 

Again,  'twas  the  terrible  bandit  of  the  gorges 
of  Ollioules,  Count  SeVe"ran,  whom  he  drove  to 
his  eyrie  on  the  heights,  with  his  cut-throats  and 
concubines. 

What  a  bold  little  chap,  this  Calendal !  One  day 
at  Sainte-Baume,  he  met  two  parties  of  knights, 
come  to  settle  their  quarrel  by  orthodox  blows  at 
the  tomb  of  Maitre  Jacques,  —  a  Provencal  who, 
an  it  please  you,  built  the  frame  of  the  temple  of 
Solomon.  Calendal,  fearing  nothing,  rushed  head- 
long in  the  midst  of  the  killing,  appeasing  the 
knights  with  his  tongue. 

Other  superhuman  undertakings !  Among  the 
rocks  of  Lure,  was  a  forest  of  cedars,  inaccessible, 
where  never  a  woodsman  dared  to  go.  Calendal 
went.  There  he  lived  all  alone  for  thirty  days. 
During  those  thirty  days  the  sound  of  his  axe  was 
heard,  driven  deep  in  the  trees.  The  forest  moaned  ; 
one  after  another  its  old,  giant  trees  fell  and  were 
rolled  to  the  foot  of  the  precipice,  so  that  when 
Calendal  came  down  not  a  cedar  remained  on  the 
mountain. 

At  last,  in  reward  for  such  prowess,  the  sardine 
fisher  obtains  the  love  of  Esterella,  and  is  named 
first  consul  by  the  dwellers  in  Cassis.  That  is 
the  tale  of  Calendal;  but  Calendal  matters  but 
little.  What  there  is  above  all  in  the  poem  is  — 
Provence ;  Provence  of  the  sea,  Provence  of  the 
mountain ;  with  its  history,  legends,  manners,  cus- 


124  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

toms,  landscapes  —  a  whole  people,  naive  and  free, 
who  have  found  their  great  poet  before  he  dies. 
And  now,  line  out  your  railways,  plant  those  tele- 
graph poles,  drive  the  Provencal  tongue  from  the 
schools !  Provence  will  live  eternally  in  Mireille 
and  in  Calendal. 

"  Enough  of  poesy !  "  cried  Mistral,  closing  his 
manuscript.  "  Let  us  go  and  see  the  fete." 

We  started ;  the  whole  village  was  in  the  streets ; 
a  great  north  wind  had  swept  the  sky,  which  was 
gleaming,  joyous,  on  the  dark  red  roofs  that  were 
damp  with  rain.  We  got  there  in  time  to  see  the 
return  of  the  procession.  For  an  hour  it  was  one 
interminable  defiling  of  cowled  penitents,  white 
penitents,  blue  penitents,  gray  penitents;  sister- 
hoods of  veiled  women,  rose-coloured  banners  with 
golden  flowers,  great  gilded  wooden  saints,  much 
tarnished,  carried  on  the  shoulders  of  men,  female 
saints  in  earthenware,  coloured  like  idols,  with  bou- 
quets in  their  hands,  copes,  monstrances,  a  green 
velvet  dais,  a  crucifix  swathed  in  white  silk  undulat- 
ing to  the  breeze  in  the  light  of  sun  and  torches, 
amid  psalms,  litanies,  and  bells  madly  ringing. 

The  procession  over,  the  saints  put  back  in  their 
chapel,  we  went  to  see  the  bulls,  then  the  games  on 
the  barn-floors,  the  wrestling,  the  three  jumps,  the 
strangle-cat,  the  bottle-game,  and  the  whole  of  the 
pretty  fun  of  a  Provence  fete.  Night  was  coming 
on  when  we  returned  to  Maillane.  On  the  square, 
before  the  little  cafe"  where  Mistral  goes  in  the  even- 
ing to  play  a  game  with  his  friend  Zidore,  a  great 


The  Poet  Mistral.  125 

bonfire  was  lighted.  The  farandole  was  organized. 
Open-work  paper  lanterns  were  lighted  in  the  dark 
corners:  youth  took  the  field;  and  soon,  at  the 
call  of  the  tambourines,  began,  around  the  flame,  a 
whirling,  noisy  dance,  which  would  last  all  night. 

After  supper,  too  weary  to  go  about  any  longer, 
Mistral  and  I  went  up  to  his  chamber,  a  mod- 
est peasant's-chamber,  with  two  large  beds.  The 
walls  are  not  papered,  the  rafters  of  the  ceiling  are 
visible.  Four  years  ago,  when  the  Academy  gave 
to  the  author  of  Mireille  that  prize  of  three  thou- 
sand francs,  Madame  Mistral  had  an  idea. 

"  Suppose  we  paper  and  cei]  your  room?" 

"No!  no!"  cried  Mistral,  "that's  the  money 
of  poets,  don't  touch  it." 

So  the  room  was  left  bare ;  but  so  long  as  the 
money  of  poets  lasted  those  who  rapped  at  Mis- 
tral's door  found  his  purse  open. 

I  had  brought  up  the  sheets  of  Calendal,  for  I 
wanted  to  make  him  read  me  a  passage  before  I 
went  to  sleep.  Mistral  chose  the  pottery  incident ; 
and  here  it  is  in  a  few  words :  — 

The  scene  is  a  great  repast,  I  know  not  where. 
They  bring  upon  the  table  a  magnificent  service 
of  the  glazed  pottery  of  Moustiers.  In  the  centre 
of  each  plate,  designed  in  blue  on  the  enamel,  is 
a  Provencal  subject;  a  whole  history  of  the  region 
is  there.  It  is  wonderful  to  see  with  what  love  the 
beautiful  service  is  described,  a  verse  to  every 
plate,  and  each  a  little  poem  of  naive  and  learned 
workmanship,  finished  as  an  idyll  of  Theocritus. 


126  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

While  Mistral  was  repeating  his  poems  in  that 
beautiful  Proven9al  language,  more  than  three- 
fourths  Latin,  the  language  that  queens  once  spoke 
and  none  but  shepherds  can  now  understand,  I 
admired  within  me  that  man ;  and,  reflecting  on  the 
condition  of  ruin  in  which  he  found  his  mother- 
tongue  and  what  he  had  made  of  it,  I  fancied  myself 
in  one  of  those  old  palaces  of  the  princes  of  Baux, 
such  as  we  still  see  in  the  Alpilles,  roofless,  with- 
out rails  to  the  porticos,  without  sashes  to  the 
windows,  the  trefoil  of  the  arches  broken,  the 
blazon  on  the  doorways  eaten  by  mosses,  hens 
marauding  in  the  courts  of  honour,  porkers  wallow- 
ing beneath  the  dainty  columns  of  the  galleries, 
donkeys  browsing  in  the  chapel  where  the  grass 
is  green,  and  pigeons  drinking  from  the  holy-water 
basins  now  filled  by  rain,  while  among  these  dilapi- 
dated remains  of  the  past,  two  or  three  families 
have  built  themselves  huts  in  the  flanks  of  the  old 
palace.  Then,  some  fine  day,  the  son  of  a  peasant 
is  seized  with  admiration  for  these  grand  ruins; 
he  is  indignant  at  seeing  them  so  profaned :  quick, 
quick,  he  drives  out  the  cattle  and  the  poultry 
from  the  court  of  honour  and  —  the  fairies  lending 
him  a  hand  —  he  reconstructs  the  great  staircase, 
replaces  the  panels  of  the  walls,  the  sashes  of  the 
windows,  builds  up  the  towers,  regilds  the  throne 
and  its  hall,  and  raises  once  more  upon  its  base 
the  vast  old  palace  of  other  days,  where  popes  and 
empresses  lodged  and  lived. 

That  restored  palace  is  the  Provencal  language. 

That  son  of  a  peasant  is  Mistral. 


Oranges.  127 


ORANGES. 

IN  Paris  oranges  have  the  melancholy  air  of 
fruit  that  is  dropped  from  the  tree  and  picked  up 
from  the  ground.  At  the  time  when  they  arrive, 
in  the  cold  and  rainy  midwinter,  their  high-coloured 
skins,  their  excessive  perfume  in  our  land  of  tran- 
quil tastes,  give  them  an  exotic  aspect,  a  little 
bohemian.  Of  a  misty  night  they  perambulate 
the  side-walks,  heaped  in  their  little  handcarts,  by 
the  dull  light  of  a  red  paper  lantern.  A  monoto- 
nous and  feeble  cry  escorts  them,  lost  in  the  roll 
of  carriages  and  the  rattle  of  omnibuses :  "  Two 
sous  a  Valentia  !  " 

To  three-fourths  of  all  Parisians,  this  fruit  gath- 
ered afar,  monotonous  in  its  roundness,  in  which  the 
tree  has  left  nothing  but  a  small  green  twig,  seems 
•to  belong  to  confectionery,  to  sweetmeats.  The 
tissue  paper  which  wraps  it,  the  fetes  it  accom- 
panies, contribute  to  this  impression.  Toward  the 
last  of  the  year  especially,  thousands  of  oranges 
disseminated  through  the  streets,  the  peels  that  lie 
about  in  the  mud  of  the  gutters,  make  one  think 
of  some  gigantic  Christmas  tree  shaking  over  Paris 
its  branches  laden  with  imitation  fruit.  Not  a 
corner  where  we  do  not;  ind  them.  In  the  large 


128  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

show  windows  selected  and  arranged ;  at  the  door 
of  prisons  and  hospitals,  among  packages  of  biscuit 
and  piles  of  apples;  before  the  entrances  to  the 
Sunday  balls  and  theatres.  Their  exquisite  per- 
fume mingles  with  the  odour  of  gas,  the  scraping 
of  fiddles,  the  dust  of  the  benches  in  paradise. 
We  have  come  to  forget  that  oranges  grow  on 
orange-trees,  for  while  the  fruit  arrives  from  the 
South  in  boxes,  the  trimmed,  transformed,  dis- 
guised tree  of  the  greenhouse  where  it  has  passed 
the  winter,  makes  but  a  short  apparition  in  our 
gardens. 

To  know  oranges  well,  you  must  see  them  at 
home,  in  the  Balearic  Isles,  in  Sardinia,  Corsica, 
Algeria,  in  the  blue,  gilded  air  and  the  warm 
atmosphere  of  the  Mediterranean.  I  remember  a 
little  grove  of  orange-trees  at  the  gates  of  Blidah; 
ah  !  it  is  there  that  they  are  beautiful.  Amid  the 
dark,  lustrous,  varnished  foliage  the  fruits  have  the 
splendour  of  coloured  glass ;  they  gild  the  envi- 
roning air  with  the  dazzling  halo  that  surrounds  a 
glowing  flower.  Here  and  there  little  clearings 
through  the  branches  showed  the  ramparts  of  the 
town,  the  minaret  of  a  mosque,  the  dome  of  a  saint's 
tomb,  and,  towering  above  them  all,  the  enormous 
mass  of  Atlas,  green  at  its  base,  and  crowned  with 
snow  like  a  fleece  or  a  white  fur  softly  fallen. 

One  night  while  I  was  there,  I  do  not  know  by 
what  phenomenon,  unknown  for  thirty  years,  that 
upper  zone  of  wintry  hoar-frost  shook  itself  down 
upon  the  sleeping  town,  and  Blidah  awoke  trans- 
formed, powdered  to  white.  In  that  Algerine  air, 


Oranges.  129 

so  light,  so  pure,  the  snow  was  like  a  dust  of 
mother-of-pearl.  It  had  all  the  reflections  of  a 
white  peacock's  plume.  Most  beautiful  of  all  was 
the  orange  grove.  The  solid  leaves  held  the  snow 
intact,  like  sherbet  on  a  lacquered  dish;  and  the 
fruit,  all  powdered  with  the  hoar-frost,  had  a  soft- 
ened splendour,  a  discreet  glow,  like  gold  veiled 
lightly  in  gauze.  The  scene  had  vaguely  the 
effect  of  a  church  festival,  of  red  cassocks  under 
robes  of  lace,  the  golden  altars  swathed  in  guipure. 
But  my  best  memory  of  oranges  comes  to  me 
from  Barbicaglia,  a  great  garden  near  Ajaccio, 
where  I  went  for  my  siesta  in  the  heat  of  the  day. 
Here  the  orange-trees,  taller  and  more  spreading 
than  those  of  Blidah,  come  down  to  the  main  road, 
from  which  the  garden  is  separated  by  only  a  ditch 
and  an  evergreen  hedge.  Immediately  beyond  is 
the  sea,  the  vast  blue  sea.  .  .  Oh  !  what  good  hours 
did  I  pass  in  that  garden !  Above  my  head  the 
orange-trees,  in  bloom  and  in  fruit,  exhaled  the 
perfume  of  their  essence.  From  time  to  time  a 
ripe  orange,  as  though  weighed  down  by  the  heat, 
fell  beside  me  with  a  flat,  echoless  sound  on  the 
fecund  earth.  I  had  only  to  put  out  my  hand. 
The  fruit  was  superb,  of  a  crimson  red  within.  It 
seemed  to  me  exquisite — and  then,  the  horizon 
was  so  beautiful !  Between  the  leaves  the  sea  put 
azure  spaces,  dazzling  as  pieces  of  broken  glass 
shimmering  in  the  quiver  of  the  air.  And  with 
all  that,  the  motion  of  the  waves  stirring  the  at- 
mosphere at  a  great  distance  with  a  cadenced 
murmur  which  rocked  you  like  an  unseen  boat, 

9 


130  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

and  the  warmth,  and  the  odour  of  the  oranges ! 
Ah !  how  good  it  was  to  sleep  in  the  garden  of 
Barbicaglia ! 

Sometimes,  however,  at  the  pleasantest  moment 
of  the  siesta,  the  roll  of  drums  would  rouse  me  with 
a  start.  It  was  those  wretched  little  drummers, 
practising  below  on  the  main-road.  Through  gaps 
in  the  hedge  I  could  see  the  brass  of  their  instru- 
ments and  their  great  white  aprons  on  their  red 
trousers.  To  shelter  themselves  a  little  from  the 
blinding  light  which  the  dust  of  the  road  reflected 
pitilessly,  the  poor  young  devils  would  plant  them- 
selves at  the  foot  of  the  garden  in  the  scanty 
shadow  of  the  hedge.  And  they  drummed  !  and 
they  were  so  hot !  Then,  wrenching  myself  forcibly 
from  my  hypnotism,  I  amused  myself  by  flinging 
them  some  of  that  beautiful  golden-red  fruit  which 
hung  close  to  my  hand.  The  drummer  first  aimed 
at  stopped.  There  was  a  moment's  hesitation,  a 
look  went  round  to  see  whence  came  that  splendid 
orange  rolling  before  him  into  the  ditch ;  then  he 
picked  it  up  very  fast  and  bit  into  it  with  his  teeth 
without  peeling  off  the  skin. 

I  remember  also  that  close  to  Barbicaglia  and 
separated  from  it  by  a  low  wall,  was  a  queer  little 
garden  that  I  could  look  into  from  the  height  where 
I  lay.  'Twas  a  small  corner  of  earth  laid  out  in 
bourgeois  fashion.  Its  paths,  yellow  with  sand 
and  bordered  with  very  green  box,  and  the  two 
cypresses  at  its  entrance  gave  it  the  appearance 
of  a  Marseillaise  surburban  villa  garden.  Not  an 
atom  of  shade.  At  the  farther  end  was  a  building 


Oranges.  1 3 1 

of  white  stone  with  cellar  windows  on  a  line  with 
the  ground.  At  first,  I  thought  it  a  country- 
house  ;  then  looking  closer,  a  cross  that  sur- 
mounted it,  an  inscription  cut  into  the  stone  that 
I  could  see  from  a  distance  without  distinguishing 
the  letters,  made  me  recognize  it  as  the  tomb 
of  a  Corsican  family.  All  around  Ajaccio,  there 
are  many  of  these  mortuary  chapels,  built  in 
gardens  of  their  own.  The  family  comes  on 
Sunday  to  pay  a  visit  to  its  dead.  Thus  treated, 
death  is  less  lugubrious  than  amid  the  confusion 
of  cemeteries.  The  feet  of  friends  alone  break 
the  silence. 

From  my  station  above,  I  could  see  a  good  old 
man  coming  and  going  tranquilly  along  the  paths. 
Every  day  he  trimmed  the  trees,  he  spaded,  watered, 
and  picked  off  the  faded  flowers  with  infinite  care ; 
then,  when  the  sun  was  setting,  he  always  entered 
the  little  chapel  where  the  dead  of  his  family  were 
sleeping;  and  he  put  away  his  spades  and  rakes 
and  watering-pots,  with  the  tranquillity,  the  serenity 
of  a  cemetery  gardener.  And  yet,  without  himself 
being  aware  of  it,  the  good  man  worked  with  a  cer- 
tain gravity ;  he  subdued  all  noises  and  closed  the 
door  of  the  vault  discreetly,  as  if  fearing  to  awaken 
an  inmate.  In  the  great  glowing  silence  the  neat- 
ness of  the  little  garden  was  never  troubled  by  even 
a  bird,  and  its  neighbourhood  had  nothing  sad  about 
it.  Only,  the  sea  seemed  more  immense,  the 
heavens  higher,  and  the  endless  siesta  shed  around 
the  place,  amid  a  troubled  nature  oppressive  in  its 
strength  of  life,  the  feeling  of  eternal  repose. 


132  Letters  from  My  Mill. 


THE  TWO  INNS. 

IT  happened  when  returning  from  Nimes,  one 
July  afternoon.  The  heat  was  exhausting.  As 
far  as  the  eye  could  reach  the  white  road,  smok- 
ing, powdered  along  between  olive-gardens  and 
scrub-oaks,  beneath  a  silvery  sun-glare  that  filled 
the  whole  sky.  (Not  a  patch  of  shade,  not  a  breath 
of  wind.)  Nothing  but  the  vibration  of  that  hot  air, 
jmd  the  strident  noise  of  the  grasshoppers,  a  crazy, 
deafening  music  to  quick  time,  which  seemed  like 
the  actual  sonority  of  that  vast  luminous  pulsa- 
tion. I  had  walked,  as  it  were  in  the  desert,  for 
two  whole  hours  when  suddenly,  before  me,  a 
group  of  white  houses  defined  themselves  in  the 
dust  from  the  road.  This  was  what  was  called  the 
"relay  of  Saint  Vincent;"  five  or  six  buildings, 
long  barns  with  red  roofs,  a  drinking  trough  with- 
out water,  in  a  clump  of  spindling  fig-trees ;  and, 
quite  at  the  farther  end,  two  large  inns  facing  each 
other  from  opposite  sides  of  the  road. 

The  neighbouring  of  these  two  inns  had  some- 
thing peculiar  about  it.  On  one  side  a  great  new 
building,  full  of  life  and  animation ;  all  doors  open, 
the  diligence  stopping  before  it,  the  smoking 
horses  there  unharnessed,  the  travellers  getting 
out  to  drink  in  haste  on  the  road  in  the  scanty 


The  Two  Inns.  133 

shadow  of  the  walls,  the  courtyard  crowded  with 
mules  and  carts  and  the  carters  lying  under  the 
sheds  for  coolness.  Within,  shouts,  oaths,  fists 
pounding  on  the  tables,  the  rattling  of  glasses 
and  billiard-balls,  lemonade  bottles  popping;  and 
above  this  din  a  joyous,  ringing  voice,  singing  in 
a  tone  that  shook  the  windows : — 

"  My  pretty  Margoton 

Early  has  risen, 
Taken  her  silver  bowl, 
Gone  to  the  cistern." 

The  inn  directly  opposite,  on  the  contrary,  was 
silent  and  as  if  abandoned.  Grass  was  under  the 
gateway,  shutters  were  broken ;  above  the  door  a 
rusty  twig  of  box  hung  down  like  a  broken  feather, 
the  step  of  the  door  was  lower  than  the  stones  of 
the  street.  It  was  all  so  poor,  so  pitiable,  that  it 
was  really  a  charity  to  stop  there  and  drink  a  drop. 

On  entering  I  found  a  long  hall,  silent  and 
gloomy,  which  the  dazzling  light  of  three  large 
windows  seemed  to  render  gloomier  and  more 
silent  still.  A  few  lame  tables  on  which  were 
glasses  dim  with  dust,  a  ragged  billiard-table  hold- 
ing out  its  pockets  like  almsbags,  a  yellow  divan, 
an  old  counter,  were  slumbering  there  in  heavy, 
unwholesome  heat.  And  flies  !  flies  !  never  did  I 
see  so  many;  on  the  ceilings,  sticking  to  the  win- 
dows, to  the  glasses,  in  clusters.  When  I  opened 
the  door  there  was  a  buzz,  and  a  humming  of  wings 
as  if  I  had  entered  a  bee-hive. 

At  the  farther  end  of  the  hall,  in  the  embrasure 


1 34  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

of  a  window  stood  a  woman,  her  face  against  the 
panes,  quite  absorbed  in  looking  out  into  the  street. 
I  called  her  twice  :  — 

"Hey!  hostess!" 

She  turned  round  slowly,  and  showed  me  a  poor 
peasant  face,  wrinkled,  fissured,  the  colour  of  the 
soil,  framed  in  long  lappets  of  rusty  lace,  such  as 
the  old  women  wear  in  these  parts.  And  yet  she 
was  not  an  old  woman;  but  tears  had  withered 
her. 

"What  do  you  want?"  she  asked,  wiping  her 
eyes. 

"  To  sit  down  a  minute,  and  drink  something." 

She  looked  at  me  much  surprised,  without  mov- 
ing from  her  place,  as  if  she  did  not  understand  me. 

"Is  not  this  an  inn?" 

The  woman  sighed. 

"Yes  —  it  is  an  inn,  if  you  choose.  But  why 
don't  you  go,  like  others,  over  the  way?  It  is 
gayer  there." 

"  It  is  too  gay  for  me.     I  prefer  to  stay  here." 

And  without  waiting  for  any  reply  I  seated  my- 
self at  a  table. 

When  she  was  sure  that  I  meant  what  I  said,  the 
landlady  bustled  about  with  a  very  busy  air,  open- 
ing drawers,  moving  bottles,  dusting  glasses,  dis- 
turbing the  flies.  One  felt  that  the  arrival  of  a 
traveller  to  serve  was  quite  an  event.  Now  and  then 
the  poor  creature  paused  and  put  her  hand  to  her 
head  as  if  she  despaired  of  accomplishing  anything. 

Then  she  went  into  a  room  at  the  end  of  the 
hall,  and  I  heard  her  jingling  keys,  trying  them  in 


The  Two  Inns.  135 

the  locks,  opening  the  bread-box,  blowing,  dust- 
ing, washing  plates.  From  time  to  time,  a  heavy 
sigh  or  a  stifled  sob. 

After  a  quarter  of  an  hour  of  this  performance 
I  had  before  me  a  dish  of  passerilles  (dried  grapes) 
an  old  loaf  of  Beaucaire  bread  as  hard  as  sand- 
stone, and  a  bottle  of  sour  wine. 

"  You  are  served,"  said  the  strange  creature ; 
and  she  turned  away  hastily  to  resume  her  station 
at  the  window. 

While  I  drank  I  tried  to  make  her  talk. 

"  You  don't  have  many  people  here,  do  you,  my 
poor  woman?  " 

"  Oh,  no,  monsieur,  never  any  one.  When  we 
were  alone  in  the  business,  things  were  very  differ- 
ent. Then  we  had  the  relays,  and  the  hunters  to 
dine  in  the  duck-season,  and  carriages  all  the  year 
round.  But  since  our  neighbours  came  and  set- 
tled here  we  have  lost  everything.  People  prefer 
to  go  opposite.  They  think  it  is  too  gloomy 
here.  The  fact  is,  this  house  is  not  very  agree- 
able. I  am  not  handsome,  I  have  fever  and  ague, 
and  my  two  little  ones  are  dead.  Over  there,  on 
the  contrary,  they  are  laughing  all  the  time.  It  is 
an  Arlesian  woman  who  keeps  that  inn,  a  hand- 
some woman  with  laces  and  three  rows  of  gold 
chain  round  her  neck.  The  conductor  is  her  lover, 
and  he  takes  the  diligence  there.  Besides  which, 
there  's  a  lot  of  cajolers  as  chamber-maids.  And 
that  brings  her  such  custom !  She  gets  all  the 
young  men  of  Bezouces,  Redessan,  and  Jon- 


1 36  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

quieres.  The  bagmen  come  out  of  their  way  to 
stop  there.  As  for  me,  I  am  left  all  day  alone, 
doing  nothing." 

She  said  it  with  an  absent,  indifferent  air,  her 
forehead  still  leaning  against  the  panes.  Evi- 
dently, there  was  something  in  that  opposite  inn 
which  absorbed  her  mind. 

All  of  a  sudden,  on  the  other  side  of  the  way,  a 
great  commotion  took  place.  The  diligence  was 
preparing  to  start.  I  heard  the  cracks  of  the 
whip,  the  postilion's  horn,  and  the  maids  about  the 
doorway  crying  out :  "  Adiousas  !  Adiousas  !  "  and 
louder  than  all,  that  strong  voice  I  had  heard  be- 
fore, singing  more  vigorously  than  ever :  — 

"  Taken  her  silver  bowl, 
Gone  to  the  cistern, 
Sees  not  approaching  her 
Three  cavaliers." 

At  the  sound  of  that  voice  the  landlady's  whole 
body  quivered,  and,  turning  to  me,  she  said  in  a 
low  voice :  — 

"  Do  you  hear  him?  That  is  my  husband. 
Does  n't  he  sing  well?  " 

I  looked  at  her,  amazed. 

"  Your  husband  !     Does  he  go  over  there,  too?  " 

Then  she,  with  a  heart-broken  air,  but  very 
gently :  — 

"It  can't  be  helped,  monsieur.  Men  are  like 
that ;  they  hate  to  see  tears ;  and  I  am  always  cry- 
ing since  I  lost  my  little  ones.  Besides,  this  great 
barrack  where  no  one  comes  is  so  gloomy.  And 
when  he  is  quite  tired  of  it  my  poor  Jose"  goes  over 


The  Two  Inns.  137 

there  to  drink,  and  as  he  has  a  fine  voice  the 
Arlesian  woman  makes  him  sing.  Hush !  there  he 
is  again." 

And,  trembling,  her  hands  outstretched,  with 
big  tears  rolling  down  her  cheeks,  making  her  look 
uglier  than  ever,  she  stood  there  as  if  in  ecstasy  to 
hear  her  Jose"  singing  for  the  Arlesian  woman :  — 

"  My  pretty  Margoton 
Early  has  risen." 


138  Letters  from  My  Mill. 


AT  MILIANAH. 
NOTES  OF  TRAVEL. 

THIS  time  I  take  you  to  spend  a  day  in  a  pretty 
little  town  of  Algeria,  two  or  three  hundred  leagues 
from  my  mill.  That  will  make  a  little  change  from 
tambourines  and  grasshoppers. 

It  is  going  to  rain,  the  sky  is  gray,  the  crests  of 
Mont  Zaccar  are  swathed  in  fog.  A  melancholy 
Sunday.  In  my  little  hotel-chamber  with  its  window 
looking  to  the  Arab  ramparts,  I  try  to  amuse  my- 
self by  lighting  cigarettes.  The  library  of  the  hotel 
has  been  placed  at  my  disposal.  Between  a  full 
and  detailed  history  of  the  registration  and  a  novel 
of  Paul  de  Kock  I  discover  a  dilapidated  volume 
of  Montaigne.  I  open  the  book  at  random  and 
re-read  the  admirable  letter  on  the  death  of  the 
Boetie.  I  am  now  more  dreamy  and  sombre  than 
ever.  A  few  drops  of  rain  are  beginning  to  fall. 
Every  drop,  as  it  falls  on  the  window  sill,  makes  a 
great  star  in  the  dust  that  has  settled  there  since 
the  rains  of  last  year.  The  book  slips  from  my 
fingers,  and  I  spend  long  minutes  in  gazing  at  that 
melancholy  splash. 

Two  o'clock  rings  from  the  tower  of  the  town  — 
the  former  tomb  of  a  saint,  the  frail  white  walls  of 
which  I  can  see  from  here.  Poor  devil  of  a  saint ! 


At  Milianah.  139 

how  little  he  thought  thirty  years  ago,  that  he 
would  carry  on  his  breast  the  huge  face  of  a 
municipal  clock,  and  that  every  Sunday  at  two 
o'clock  he  would  give  to  the  churches  of  Milianah 
the  signal  to  ring  for  vespers.  Ding  dong  !  there 
go  the  bells  !  and  long  will  they  ring.  Decidedly, 
this  room  is  melancholy.  Those  big  matutinal 
spiders  called  philosophical  thoughts  are  spinning 
their  webs  in  every  corner.  I  shall  go  out. 

I  reach  the  great  square.  The  band  of  the  3rd 
infantry,  which  a  little  rain  does  not  frighten,  is 
gathering  round  its  leader.  At  one  of  the  windows 
of  headquarters  the  general  appears,  surrounded 
by  his  young  ladies ;  on  the  square  the  sub-prefect 
is  walking  about  arm  in  arm  with  the  justice  of 
peace.  Half  a  dozen  little  Arabs,  nearly  naked, 
are  playing  marbles  in  a  corner  with  ferocious 
yells.  Over  there  is  an  old  Jew  in  rags  seeking 
for  the  sunshine  he  left  on  that  spot  yesterday,  and 
quite  surprised  not  to  find  it.  "  One,  two,  three  !  " 
and  the  band  starts  off  with  an  old  mazurka  by 
Talexy  which  the  barrel  organs  were  playing 
under  my  window  a  year  ago.  That  mazurka 
annoyed  me  then ;  to-day  it  moves  me  to  tears. 

Oh  !  how  lucky  they  are  those  musicians  of  the 
3rd  infantry.  Their  eyes  fixed  on  their  semi- 
quavers, tipsy  with  rhythm  and  racket,  they  are 
thinking  of  nothing  but  counting  their  time. 
Their  soul,  their  whole  soul  is  in  that  square 
of  paper  the  size  of  my  hand  which  trembles  at 
the  end  of  their  instruments  between  two  brass 


140  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

pins.  "  One,  two,  three !  "  That 's  the  whole 
of  it  for  those  worthy  fellows;  never  do  the 
national  airs  they  play  give  them  a  thought  of 
home-sickness.  Alas  !  I,  who  am  not  of  the  band, 
am  distressed  by  the  band,  and  I  depart. 

Where  shall  I  spend  it,  this  dismal  Sunday  after- 
noon? .  .  Good!  Sid'  Omar's  shop  is  open.  I'll 
spend  it  with  Sid'  Omar. 

Though  he  has  a  shop,  Sid'  Omar  is  not  a  shop- 
keeper. He  is  a  prince  of  the  blood,  the  son  of 
a  former  Dey  of  Algiers  who  was  strangled  by 
the  janissaries.  On  the  death  of  his  father,  Sid' 
Omar  took  refuge  in  Milianah  with  his  mother, 
whom  he  adored,  and  there  he  lived  some  years 
philosophically  as  a  great  seigneur,  among  his 
hounds  and  falcons,  his  horses  and  his  women, 
in  pretty,  airy  palaces  full  of  orange-trees  and 
fountains.  Then  came  the  French.  Sid'  Omar, 
at  first  our  enemy  and  the  ally  of  Abd-el-Kader, 
ended  by  quarrelling  with  the  emir  and  making 
his  submission  to  us.  Abd-el-Kader,  to  avenge 
himself,  entered  Milianah,  during  Sid*  Omar's 
absence,  pillaged  his  palaces,  cut  down  his  orange- 
trees,  carried  off  his  horses  and  women,  and  caused 
his  mother's  throat  to  be  crushed  by  the  shutting 
down  of  the  lid  of  a  great  coffer.  The  anger  of 
Sid'  Omar  was  terrible.  Instantly  he  entered  the 
French  service,  and  we  had  no  better  or  more 
ferocious  soldier  than  he  during  all  the  time  the 
war  against  the  emir  lasted.  That  war  over, 
Sid'  Omar  returned  to  Milianah;  but  even  to-day 


At  Milianah.  141 

if  you  mention  the  name  of  Abd-el-Kader  in  his 
presence,  he  turns  pale,  and  his  eyes  blaze. 

Sid'  Omar  is  sixty  years  old.  In  spite  of  years 
and  the  smallpox,  his  face  is  still  handsome ;  long 
lashes,  the  glance  of  a  woman,  a  charming  smile, 
the  air  of  a  prince.  Ruined  by  the  war,  nothing 
is  left  of  his  former  opulence  but  a  farm  on  the 
Chelif  plain,  and  a  house  at  Milianah,  where  he 
lives  in  bourgeois  fashion  with  his  three  sons, 
whom  he  is  bringing  up  under  his  own  eye.  The 
native  chieftains  hold  him  in  great  veneration. 
When  a  discussion  arises  they  willingly  take  him 
as  umpire;  and  his  decision  is  almost  always  re- 
garded as  law.  He  seldom  goes  out;  you  will 
find  him  every  afternoon  in  a  shop  adjoining  his 
house,  which  opens  on  the  street.  The  furniture 
of  this  place  is  not  splendid, — white-washed  walls, 
a  circular  wooden  bench,  cushions,  pipes,  and  two 
foot-warmers.  That  is  where  Sid'  Omar  gives  au- 
dience and  lays  down  the  law.  Solomon  in  a  shop. 

To-day,  being  Sunday,  the  company  is  numerous. 
A  dozen  sheiks  are  crouched  in  their  burnous, 
round  the  room.  Each  has  beside  him  a  large 
pipe  and  a  little  cup  of  coffee  in  a  delicate  filigree 
holder.  I  enter;  no  one  stirs.  From  his  place 
Sid'  Omar  sends  me  his  most  charming  smile 
and  invites  me  with  his  hand  to  sit  near  him  on 
a  large  cushion  of  yellow  silk.  Then,  with  his 
finger  on  his  lips,  he  makes  me  a  sign  to 
listen. 

This   is   why:  The  card  of  the   Benizougzougs 


142  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

having  a  dispute  with  a  Milianah  Jew  about  a  bit  of 
ground,  both  parties  had  agreed  to  carry  the 
matter  to  Sid'  Omar  and  submit  to  his  decision. 
Appointment  was  made  for  the  same  day;  the 
witnesses  were  summoned ;  when,  all  of  a  sudden, 
the  Jew  changed  his  mind,  and  came  alone,  with- 
out witnesses,  to  declare  that  he  preferred  to  sub- 
mit the  matter  to  the  French  justice  of  peace, 
rather  than  Sid'  Omar.  That  was  how  the  affair 
stood  at  my  entrance. 

The  Jew  —  old,  with  a  dirty  beard,  maroon 
jacket,  blue  stockings,  velvet  cap  —  raised  his  nose 
to  heaven,  rolled  supplicating  eyes,  kissed  the 
slippers  of  Sid'  Omar,  bowed  his  head  and  knelt 
with  clasped  hands.  I  don't  understand  Arabic, 
but  from  this  pantomime,  during  which  the  words 
"  joustice  of  peace,  joustice  of  peace  "  recurred 
incessantly,  I  could  guess  the  whole  of  the  shrewd 
meaning:  — 

"  We  do  not  doubt  Sid'  Omar  ;  Sid'  Omar  is  wise, 
Sid*  Omar  is  just.  But  the  joustice  of  peace  will 
do  better  by  us." 

The  audience,  indignant,  remained  impassible, 
as  Arabs  are  wont  to  be.  Stretched  out  upon  his 
cushion,  eyes  hazy,  the  amber-mouth-piece  be- 
tween his  lips,  Sid'  Omar  —  god  of  irony  —  smiled 
as  he  listened.  Suddenly,  in  the  midst  of  his  wiliest 
sentence,  the  Jew  is  interrupted  by  an  energetic 
"  Caramba !  "  which  stops  him  short ;  and  at  the 
same  instant  a  Spanish  colonist,  who  was  there  as 
a  witness  for  the  catd,  left  his  place,  and  approach- 
ing Iscariot  poured  upon  him  a  deluge  of  impreca- 


At  Milianah.  143 

tions  in  all  tongues  and  all  colours  —  among  them 
a  certain  French  vocable  too  gross,  monsieur,  to 
repeat  here.  The  son  of  Sid'  Omar,  who  under- 
stood French,  blushed  at  hearing  such  a  word  in 
his  father's  presence  and  left  the  place.  (Remem- 
ber this  trait  of  Arab  education.) 

The  audience  was  still  impassible,  Sid'  Omar 
still  smiling.  The  Jew  rose  and  backed  towards 
the  door,  trembling  with  fear,  but  still  warbling  his 
eternal  "joustice  of  peace,  joustice  of  peace."  He 
went  out.  The  Spaniard  furious,  rushed  after  him 
and  twice  —  vli !  vlan  !  —  struck  him  in  the  face. 
Iscariot  fell  on  his  knees,  his  arms  crossed.  The 
Spaniard,  rather  ashamed,  returned  to  the  shop. 
As  soon  as  he  had  entered,  the  Jew  picked  himself 
up,  and  turned  an  artful  eye  on  the  variegated 
crowd  that  surrounded  him;  a  crowd  in  which 
there  were  men  of  all  skins — Maltese,  Mahonese, 
negroes,  Arabs,  all  united  in  hatred  to  a  Jew  and 
delighting  in  seeing  him  maltreated.  Iscariot  hesi- 
tated a  moment ;  then,  taking  an  Arab  by  the  flap 
of  his  burnous, — 

"You  saw  it,  Achmed,  you  saw  it;  you  were 
there.  The  Christian  struck  me.  You  must  be 
witness  —  yes,  yes,  you  shall  be  witness." 

The  Arab  freed  his  burnous  and  pushed  away 
the  Jew.  He  knows  nothing;  he  saw  nothing; 
he  was  looking  the  other  way. 

"  But  you,  Kadour,  you  saw  it ;  you  saw  the 
Christian  strike  me,"  cries  the  luckless  Iscariot  to 
a  big  negro  who  was  peeling  a  Barbary  fig. 

The  negro  spat  in  sign  of  contempt,  and  walked 


1 44  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

away  —  he  had  seen  nothing.  Neither  had  a  little 
Maltese  fellow  seen  anything  with  his  coal-black 
eyes  glittering  malignantly  beneath  his  beretta; 
nor  she,  that  Mahonese  woman  with  the  brick- 
coloured  skin,  who  ran  off  laughing,  carrying  a 
basket  of  pomegranates  on  her  head. 

In  vain  did  Iscariot  shout,  beg,  beseech  —  not 
a  witness,  no  one  had  seen  anything.  By  great 
good  luck  two  of  his  co-religionists  happened  to 
come  by  at  this  moment,  skirting  the  walls  with  a 
hang-dog  look.  The  Jew  spied  them. 

"  Quick,  quick,  brothers !  quick  to  the  joustice 
of  peace!  You  saw  him,  you  two;  you  saw  him 
how  he  struck  the  old  man." 

Had  they  seen  it?     I  should  think  so ! 

Great  excitement  in  Sid'  Omar's  shop.  The 
coffeeman  refilled  the  cups  and  relit  the  pipes. 
They  talked,  they  laughed  with  all  their  teeth.  It 
is  so  amusing  to  see  a  Jew  beaten  !  In  the  midst 
of  the  general  clatter  I  slipped  softly  to  the  door ;  I 
wanted  to  wander  about  the  Jewish  quarter  and 
see  how  Iscariot's  co-religionists  were  taking  the 
affront  thus  put  upon  their  brother. 

"  Come  and  dine  to-night,  moussieu"  called  out 
the  good  Sid'  Omar. 

I  accepted,  thanked  him,  and  went  out. 

In  the  Jewish  quarter  every  one  was  afoot. 
The  affair  had  already  made  a  great  noise.  No 
one  was  inside  the  booths.  Embroiderers,  tailors, 
harness-makers  —  all  Israel  was  in  the  streets. 
The  men,  wearing  velvet  caps  and  blue  stockings, 


At  Milianah.  145 

gesticulated  noisily  in  groups.  The  women,  pale, 
puffy,  stiff  as  wooden  idols  in  their  tight  gowns 
with  gilded  stomachers,  their  faces  framed  in 
heavy  black  bandeaux,  were  going  from  group  to 
group,  caterwauling.  Just  as  I  arrived  a  great 
impulse  was  given  to  the  crowd.  They  pressed 
together  and  hurried  along.  Accompanied  by  his 
witnesses,  the  Jew,  the  hero  of  the  adventure, 
passed  between  two  hedges  of  his  co-religionists 
under  a  rain  of  exhortations :  — 

"  Avenge  yourself,  brother !  Avenge  us ! 
Avenge  the  Jewish  people!  Fear  nothing;  you 
have  the  law  on  your  side." 

A  frightful  dwarf,  smelling  of  pitch  and  old 
leather,  came  up  to  me  with  a  piteous  air  and  said, 
sighing  heavily :  — 

"  You  see  how  they  treat  us  poor  Jews.  He 
is  an  old  man !  look  at  him.  They  have  nearly 
killed  him." 

And,  in  truth,  poor  Iscariot  did  look  more  dead 
than  alive.  He  passed  in  front  of  me  —  eyes 
dulled,  face  ghastly;  not  walking  but  dragging 
himself  along.  A  good  indemnity  alone  could 
cure  him.  Consequently,  they  did  not  take  him 
to  a  doctor,  but  to  a  lawyer. 

There  are  many  lawyers  in  Algeria,  almost  as 
many  as  there  are  grasshoppers.  The  trade  is 
a  good  one,  they  say.  At  any  rate,  it  has  this 
advantage,  it  can  be  taken  up  at  any  time,  without 
examinations,  without  sureties,  without  probation. 
Just  as  in  Paris  we  make  ourselves  men  of  letters, 

10 


146  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

in  Algeria  they  make  themselves  lawyers.  It  is 
enough  to  know  a  little  French,  Spanish,  Arabic, 
to  have  a  code  at  your  fingers'  ends,  and,  above 
all,  the  temperament  of  the  trade. 

As  for  the  functions  of  this  agent,  they  are 
varied ;  by  turns  solicitor,  barrister,  court  official, 
expert,  interpreter,  book-keeper,  commissioner, 
public  writer,  he  is  the  Maitre  Jacques  of  the 
colony.  Only,  Harpagon  had  but  one  Maitre 
Jacques,  and  the  colony  has  more  than  it  wants. 
At  Milianah  alone  they  count  by  dozens.  As  a 
general  thing,  these  gentlemen,  to  avoid  the  cost 
of  an  office,  receive  their  clients  at  the  cafe"  in  the 
great  square,  and  hold  their  consultations  —  do 
they  consult  at  all  ?  —  between  absinthe  and 
champoreau. 

It  was  towards  the  cafe"  in  the  great  square  that 
the  worthy  Iscariot  was  now  proceeding,  flanked  by 
his  two  witnesses.  We  will  not  follow  him. 

• 

In  leaving  the  Jewish  quarter  I  passed  before 
the  house  of  what  is  called  the  Arab  Bureau. 
Outside,  with  its  slate  roof  and  the  French  flag 
floating  above  it,  you  would  take  it  for  the  town- 
hall  of  some  village.  I  know  the  interpreter,  and 
I  enter  to  smoke  a  cigar  with  him.  One  way  or 
another  I  shall  manage  to  kill  it,  this  sunless 
Sunday ! 

The  courtyard  in  front  of  the  bureau  is  en- 
cumbered with  Arabs  in  rags.  Fifty,  at  least,  are 
in  attendance,  crouching  along  the  walls  in  their 
burnous.  This  Bedouin  antechamber  exhales  — 


At  Milianah.  147 

though  in  the  open  air  —  a  strong  odour  of  human 
skins.  Let  us  pass  through  quickly.  In  the 
bureau  I  find  the  interpreter  involved  with  two 
big  brawlers,  entirely  naked  under  long  greasy 
coverlets,  who  are  relating  with  savage  gestures 
some  story,  I  know  not  what,  of  a  stolen  chaplet. 
I  seat  myself  on  a  mat  in  the  corner,  and  look  on.  .  . 
A  pretty  costume  that  of  interpreters,  and  how 
jauntily  the  interpreter  of  Milianah  wears  it ! 
Clothes  and  man,  they  look  as  if  they  had  been 
invented  for  each  other.  The  costume  is  sky- 
blue,  with  black  froggings  and  gilt  buttons  that 
shine.  The  interpreter  himself  is  fair,  rosy,  and 
curled ;  a  charming  blue  hussar,  full  of  humour 
and  whimsicality;  quite  talkative  —  he  speaks  all 
languages  —  and  rather  sceptical,  having  known 
Renan  at  the  Oriental  College:  he  is  a  great 
lover  of  sport ;  as  much  at  his  ease  in  an  Arab 
bivouac  as  he  is  in  the  salons  of  the  sub-prefecture, 
mazurking  better  than  any  one  and  making  kouss- 
kouss  better  still.  A  Parisian,  —  to  say  it  all  in 
one  word,  —  and  you  need  not  be  surprised  that 
the  women  dote  upon  him.  In  the  matter  of 
dandyism,  he  has  but  one  rival  —  the  sergeant  of 
the  Arab  Bureau.  The  latter,  in  his  broadcloth 
tunic  and  his  gaiters  with  mother-of-pearl  buttons, 
is  the  despair  and  envy  of  the  whole  garrison. 
Detailed  to  the  Arab  Bureau  he  is  relieved  from 
fatigue  duty,  and  shows  himself  about  the  streets 
in  white  gloves,  hair  freshly  curled,  with  registers 
under  his  arm.  He  is  admired,  and  feared.  He 
is  an  authority. 


148  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

Decidedly,  this  tale  of  the  stolen  chaplet  threat- 
ens to  be  very  long.  Good-bye !  I  won't  wait  for 
the  end  of  it. 

As  I  depart  I  find  the  courtyard  antechamber 
in  commotion.  The  crowd  is  pressing  round  a 
tall  Arab,  pale  and  proud,  draped  in  a  black 
burnous.  This  man  had  a  tussle  in  the  Zaccar 
a  week  earlier  with  a  panther.  The  panther  is 
dead,  but  the  man  has  an  arm  badly  bitten.  Night 
and  morning  he  comes  to  have  his  wound  dressed 
at  the  Arab  Bureau,  and  every  time  he  comes  he 
is  stopped  in  the  courtyard  and  made  to  relate  the 
whole  adventure.  He  speaks  slowly,  in  a  beauti- 
ful deep  voice.  Now  and  then  he  opens  his 
burnous  and  shows,  fastened  to  his  breast,  the  left 
arm  bound  with  bloody  bandages. 

I  was  hardly  in  the  street  before  a  storm  burst  vio- 
lently. Rain,  thunder,  lightning,  sirocco.  Quick  ! 
to  shelter !  I  darted  through  a  gate,  hap-hazard, 
and  fell  into  the  midst  of  a  nest  of  bohemians, 
crouching  under  the  arcades  of  a  Moorish  court. 
This  court  is  next  to  the  mosque  of  Milianah ;  it  is 
the  habitual  refuge  of  Mussulman  vagrants,  and  is 
therefore  called  the  "  court  of  the  paupers." 

Great  gaunt  hounds,  covered  with  vermin,  came 
snuffing  round  me  with  a  wicked  air.  Leaning 
against  one  of  the  pillars  of  the  gallery,  I  endeav- 
oured to  put  a  good  face  on  the  matter,  and, 
without  speaking  to  any  one,  I  watched  the  rain 
ricochetting  on  the  coloured  tiles  of  the  court- 
yard. The  beggars  were  on  the  ground  in  piles. 


At  Milianah.  149 

Near  me  a  young  woman,  almost  handsome,  with 
bare  neck  and  legs,  and  heavy  iron  bracelets  on 
wrists  and  ankles,  was  singing  a  strange  air  on 
three  sad,  whining  notes.  As  she  sang,  she  nursed 
at  her  breast  a  little  naked  child  of  a  bronze-red 
colour,  while  with  her  one  free  arm  she  pounded 
barley  in  a  stone  mortar.  The  rain,  driven  by  the 
cruel  wind,  soaked  at  times  the  legs  of  the  woman 
and  the  body  of  her  nursling.  She  paid  no  heed 
'to  it,  but  continued  to  sing  through  the  storm, 
crushing  the  barley  and  suckling  the  child. 

The  tempest  slackened.  Profiting  by  a  break 
in  the  clouds,  I  hastened  away  from  the  Moorish 
court  in  the  direction  of  Sid'  Omar  and  his  dinner. 
It  was  high  time.  Crossing  the  great  square,  I 
again  met  the  old  Jew.  He  was  leaning  on  the 
lawyer's  arm,  his  witnesses  walked  joyfully  after 
him,  and  a  band  of  villanous  little  Jew  boys  skipped 
along  with  the  party.  Their  faces  were  radiant. 
The  lawyer  had  taken  charge  of  the  affair,  and 
was  on  his  way  to  ask  for  an  indemnity  of  two 
thousand  francs. 

At  Sid'  Omar's  a  sumptuous  dinner.  The  dining- 
room  opens  on  an  elegant  Moorish  court,  where 
two  or  three  fountains  are  singing.  Excellent 
Turkish  repast,  recommended  to  Baron  Brisse. 
Among  other  dishes,  I  remember  a  chicken  with 
almonds,  kouss-kouss  a  la  vanille,  a  turtle  stuffed 
with  meat  —  a  little  heavy  perhaps,  but  very  appe- 
tizing—  and  biscuits  made  of  honey,  called  bouch^es 
de  cadi.  By  way  of  wine,  champagne  only.  In 


1 50  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

spite  of  the  Mussulman  law,  Sid'  Omar  drank  a  lit- 
tle of  it,  when  the  servants'  backs  were  turned. 
After  dinner  we  removed  to  our  host's  bedcham- 
ber, and  there  they  brought  us  confectionery,  pipes, 
and  coffee.  The  furniture  of  this  room  is  of  the 
simplest :  a  divan,  a  few  mats,  at  the  farther  end  a 
very  high  large  bed,  on  which  red  cushions  em- 
broidered in  gold  are  scattered  about.  Hanging 
to  the  wall  is  an  old  Turkish  picture  representing 
the  exploits  of  a  certain  admiral,  Hamadi.  It 
seems  that  in  Turkey  painters  use  but  one  colour 
to  each  picture ;  this  picture  is  vowed  to  green. 
The  sea,  the  sky,  the  ship,  Admiral  Hamadi  him- 
self, all  are  green  —  and  what  a  green  ! 

Arab  customs  require  you  to  retire  early.  Coffee 
taken  and  the  pipes  smoked,  I  wished  good-night 
to  my  host,  and  left  him  with  his  women. 

Where  shall  I  finish  my  evening?  It  is  too  early 
to  go  to  bed ;  the  bugles  of  the  spahis  have  not 
yet  sounded  taps.  Besides,  the  golden  cushions  of 
Sid'  Omar  dance  fantastic  farandoles  about  me, 
and  would  hinder  me  from  sleeping.  Lo !  here 
I  am  before  a  theatre;  suppose  I  enter  for  a 
moment? 

The  theatre  of  Milianah  is  an  old  forage  store- 
house, more  or  less  disguised  for  stage  purposes. 
Huge  glass  cups  which  they  fill  with  oil  between 
the  acts  serve  as  lustres.  The  pit  stands;  the 
occupants  of  the  orchestra  sit  on  benches.  The 
galleries  are  very  proud  because  they  have  straw 
chairs.  All  around  the  audience  chamber  is  a  long 


At  Milianah.  151 

dark  passage,  unfloored,  where  one  might  think 
one's  self  in  the  street.  The  play  has  already  begun 
when  I  enter.  To  my  great  surprise,  the  actors 
are  not  bad ;  I  speak  of  the  men ;  they  have  spirit 
and  animation,  life.  Nearly  all  are  amateurs,  sol- 
diers of  the  third  infantry ;  the  regiment  is  proud 
of  them,  and  comes  nightly  to  applaud  their  per- 
formance. 

As  for  the  women,  alas !  they  are  ever  and  al- 
ways that  "  eternal  feminine "  of  the  little  provin- 
cial stage  —  pretentious,  exaggerated,  and  false. 
Among  them,  however,  there  are  two  who  in- 
terest me,  two  Milianah  Jewesses,  very  young, 
who  are  making  their  first  appearance  in  public. 
Their  parents  are  in  the  hall  and  seem  enchanted. 
They  are  convinced  that  their  daughters  will  earn 
millions  of  douros  in  the  business.  The  legend  of 
Rachel,  Israelite,  millionaire,  and  actress,  has  spread 
among  the  Jews  of  the  Orient.  Nothing  could  be 
more  comical,  yet  affecting,  than  those  two  little 
Jewesses  on  the  stage.  They  kept  themselves  tim- 
idly in  a  corner  of  it,  painted,  powdered,  low-necked, 
and  perfectly  rigid.  They  were  cold ;  they  felt 
ashamed.  Now  and  then,  they  sputtered  a  speech 
without  understanding  it,  and  while  they  spoke 
their  great  black  Hebrew  eyes  wandered  round 
the  audience-chamber,  stupefied. 

I  leave  the  theatre.  Amid  the  darkness  that 
surrounds  me,  I  hear  cries  in  the  corner  of  the 
square.  A  few  Maltese,  no  doubt,  who  are  en- 
gaged in  explaining  something  with  knives. 


152  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

I  return  to  my  hotel,  slowly,  by  way  of  the  ram- 
parts. Adorable  odours  of  orange-trees  and 
thuyas  rise  from  the  plain.  The  air  is  soft,  the 
sky  almost  cloudless.  Below,  at  the  farther  end 
of  the  road,  rises  the  ghost  of  an  old  wall,  the  re- 
mains of  some  ancient  temple.  That  wall  is  sacred. 
Every  day  the  Arab  women  flock  there  to  hang 
their  votive  offerings  upon  it,  —  fragments  of  stuffs, 
long  tresses  of  ruddy  hair  tied  with  silver  threads, 
pieces  of  burnous.  All  this  is  floating  in  the  moon- 
rays  to  the  soft  breath  of  the  balmy  night. 


The  Locusts. 


'53 


THE   LOCUSTS. 

ONE  more  recollection  of  Algeria,  and  then  we 
will  return  to  my  mill. 

The  night  of  my  arrival  at  that  farm-house  in  the 
Sahel  I  could  not  sleep.  The  novelty  of  the  country, 
the  agitation  of  the  voyage,  the  barking  of  the  jack- 
als, also  an  enervating  oppressive  heat,  a  choking 
atmosphere  as  if  the  meshes  of  the  mosquito  net 
did  not  allow  of  the  passing  of  a  breath  of  air. 
When  I  opened  my  window  at  dawn  a  heavy  sum- 
mer fog,  slowly  moving,  fringed  at  its  edges  with 
black  and  rose,  floated  in  the  air  like  a  cloud  of 
smoke  on  a  battlefield.  Not  a  leaf  stirred,  and  in 
the  beautiful  gardens  which  lay  before  my  eyes,  the 
vines  planted  at  regular  distances  on  the  slopes  ex- 
posed to  the  sun  which  makes  those  sugary  wines, 
the  fruits  of  Europe  sheltering  in  a  shady  corner, 
the  little  orange-trees,  the  mandarins  in  long  micro- 
scopic lines  —  all  these  wore  the  same  mournful 
aspect,  the  stillness  of  leaves  expecting  a  storm. 
The  banana-trees  themselves,  those  great  reeds  of 
a  tender  green,  always  shaken  by  a  breeze  ruffling 
their  delicate  fine  hair,  now  rose  silent  and  erect  in 
regular  bunches. 


1 54  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

I  stood  a  moment  looking  at  this  marvellous 
plantation,  where  all  the  trees  in  the  world  were 
collected,  giving,  each  in  its  season,  their  flowers 
and  their  exiled  fruits.  Between  the  wheat-fields 
and  the  groves  of  cork-trees,  a  stream  of  water 
shone,  refreshing  to  the  sight  on  this  suffocating 
morning ;  and  while  I  admired  the  luxury,  the  per- 
fect order  of  all  before  me,  and  the  beautiful  farm- 
house with  its  Moorish  arcades,  the  terraces  white  in 
the  dawn,  the  stables  and  sheds  around  it,  I  reflected 
that  twenty  years  earlier,  when  the  good  people 
who  owned  the  place  had  come  to  settle  in  this 
valley  of  the  Sahel,  they  had  found  nothing  but  a 
wretched  hut  and  a  barren  land  bristling  with 
dwarf  palms  and  cactus.  All  to  create,  all  to  con- 
struct. At  every  moment  revolts  of  the  Arabs. 
The  plough  was  left  in  the  furrow  to  fire  the 
musket.  Besides  this,  diseases,  ophthalmias,  fevers, 
failure  of  crops,  the  groping  of  inexperience, 
struggles  with  a  narrow-minded  administration 
forever  changing.  What  efforts  !  What  fatigue  ! 
What  incessant  watchfulness ! 

And  even  now,  though  the  bad  times  were  over, 
and  fortune  was  dearly  won,  they  both,  the  man  and 
his  wife,  were  the  first  to  be  up  in  the  morning. 
At  this  early  hour  I  heard  them  going  and  coming 
in  the  great  kitchens  of  the  lower  floor,  superin- 
tending the  coffee  of  the  labourers.  Soon  a  bell 
rang,  and  a  moment  later  workmen  defiled  along 
the  road,  — vineyard  men  from  Burgundy,  Kabyle 
labourers  in  rags  wearing  the  red  fez,  Mahonese 
navvies  with  bare  legs,  Maltese,  Italians;  an  in- 


The  Locusts.  155 

congruous,  dissimilar  populace,  difficult  to  man- 
age. To  each  of  them  the  farmer,  standing  before 
the  door,  gave  his  task  for  the  day  in  a  curt  voice, 
rather  roughly.  When  this  was  over,  the  good  man 
raised  his  head,  examined  the  sky  with  an  anxious 
air,  and  seeing  me  at  the  window  he  said :  "  Bad 
weather  for  farming ;  here 's  the  sirocco." 

And  sure  enough,  as  the  sun  rose,  puffs  of  burn- 
ing, suffocating  air  came  to  us  from  the  South  as 
if  from  the  door  of  an  oven  opening  and  shutting. 
Presently  one  knew  not  where  to  put  one's  self,  or 
what  to  do.  The  whole  morning  passed  thus. 
We  took  coffee  on  the  straw  mats  in  the  gallery, 
without  courage  to  speak  or  stir.  The  dogs  lying 
at  full  length  in  exhausted  attitudes  sought  cool- 
ness on  the  flags.  Breakfast  revived  us  a  little,  a 
plentiful  and  singular  breakfast,  in  which  there 
were  carp,  trout,  wild  boar,  hedgehog,  Staoueli 
butter,  wines  of  Crescia,  guavas,  bananas,  a  mass 
of  strange  food  in  keeping  with  the  complex  Nature 
that  surrounded  us.  .  .  We  were  about  to  rise  from 
table.  Suddenly  at  the  glass-door,  closed  to  pro- 
tect us  from  the  furnace  heat  of  the  garden,  loud 
cries  were  heard  :  "  The  locusts  !  the  locusts  !  " 

My  host  turned  pale,  like  a  man  to  whom  a 
great  disaster  is  told,  and  we  rushed  out  hastily. 
During  the  next  ten  minutes  the  house,  lately  so 
calm,  was  filled  with  the  sound  of  rushing  feet, 
confused  voices,  lost  in  the  agitation  of  that  warn- 
ing. From  the  shade  of  the  vestibules  where  some 
were  still  sleeping,  the  servants  sprang  forth,  with 
sticks,  scythes,  flails,  making  them  ring  on  all  the 


156  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

metal  utensils  they  could  lay  their  hands  on,  copper 
caldrons,  warming-pans,  saucepans.  The  shep- 
herds blew  their  pipes  in  the  pastures.  Others 
had  conch-shells  and  hunting-horns.  The  uproar 
was  frightful,  discordant,  while  high  above  it  all 
rang  the  shrill  high  note,  the  "  Yoo  !  yoo  !  yoo  !  " 
of  the  Arab  women  rushing  in  from  a  neighbour- 
ing douar.  It  seems  that  often  a  great  noise,  a 
sonorous  jarring  of  the  air,  is  sufficient  to  drive  off 
the  locusts  and  prevent  them  from  alighting. 

But  where  were  they,  these  terrible  beasts  ?  In 
the  sky,  pulsing  with  heat,  I  saw  nothing  but  a 
cloud  on  the  horizon,  brassy,  compact  as  a  hail- 
cloud,  coming  on  with  the  noise  of  a  wind-storm 
through  the  branches  of  a  forest.  This  was  the 
locusts.  Supporting  one  another  with  their  dry 
extended  wings  they  flew  in  a  mass ;  and  in  spite 
of  our  shouts,  our  efforts,  on  they  came  in  a  cloud 
casting  upon  the  plain  an  enormous  shadow.  Soon 
they  arrived  above  us  and  we  saw  for  a  second  on 
the  edges  of  the  cloud  a  fringe,  a  rent.  Like  the 
first  stones  of  a  hailstorm,  a  few  detached  them- 
selves, distinct,  reddish;  then  the  whole  cloud 
broke  up  and  the  rain  of  insects  fell  thick  and 
noisily.  The  fields,  as  far  as  the  eye  could  reach, 
were  covered  with  locusts,  enormous  locusts,  thick 
as  my  finger. 

Now  the  massacre  began.  A  horrid  sound  of 
crushing,  like  that  of  trampled  straw.  With  harrows, 
spades,  ploughs,  they  broke  up  that  living  soil ;  but 
the  more  they  killed,  the  more  there  were  to  kill. 
The  insects  swarmed  in  layers,  their  long  legs  laced 


The  Locusts.  157 

together.  Those  at  the  top  made  leaps  of  fear, 
jumping  at  the  noses  of  the  horses  harnessed  for 
this  strange  labour.  The  farm-dogs,  those  of  the 
dottar,  driven  into  the  fields,  sprang  upon  them  and 
ground  them  furiously  with  their  teeth.  At  this 
moment  two  companies  of  Turcos,  bugles  sound- 
ing, came  to  the  succour  of  the  luckless  colonists 
and  the  butchery  changed  aspect. 

Instead  of  crushing  the  locusts  the  soldiers 
spread  long  trains  of  gunpowder  and  blew  them 
up. 

Weary  with  killing,  sickened  by  the  fetid  odour, 
I  returned  to  the  house.  Within  it  there  were 
almost  as  many  locusts  as  without.  They  had 
entered  by  the  doors,  the  windows,  the  flues  of 
the  chimney.  Along  the  panels  and  wainscot- 
ings,  in  the  curtains  already  riddled,  they  crawled, 
fell,  flew,  and  climbed  the  white  walls,  casting 
gigantic  shadows  that  doubled  their  ugliness. 
And  always  that  horrifying  odour.  We  were 
forced,  at  dinner,  to  go  without  water.  The  cis- 
terns, basins,  wells,  fish-pond  were  all  infected. 
That  night  in  my  room  where  quantities  had  been 
killed,  I  heard  them  swarming  under  the  furniture, 
with  that  crackling  of  their  shell-like  wings  which 
sounds  like  the  bursting  of  pods  under  heat. 
This  night  again  I  could  not  sleep.  Besides, 
every  one  on  the  farm  was  astir.  Flames  were 
running  along  the  surface  of  the  ground  in  all 
directions  from  one  end  of  the  plain  to  the  other. 
The  Turcos  were  still  killing. 

The  next  day,  when  I  opened  my  window  the 


158  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

locusts  were  gone;  but  what  ruin  they  had  left 
behind  them  !  Not  a  flower,  not  a  blade  of  grass ; 
all  was  black,  devoured,  calcined.  The  banana, 
the  apricot,  the  peach-trees,  the  orange-trees 
could  only  be  recognized  by  the  shape  of  their 
stripped  branches;  the  charm  and  the  floating 
grace  of  foliage  which  is  the  life  of  the  tree  were 
gone.  The  pieces  of  water  and  the  cisterns  were 
being  cleaned.  Everywhere  labourers  were  dig- 
ging the  earth  to  kill  the  eggs  laid  by  the  insects. 
Every  turf  was  turned,  and  carefully  broken  up. 
And  one's  heart  ached  to  see  the  thousand  white 
roots  full  of  sap  which  appeared  in  this  destruction 
of  the  fruitful  earth. 


The  Elixir  of  Pere  Gaudier.         1 59 


THE    ELIXIR    OF  THE   REVEREND   PERE 
GAUCHER. 

"  DRINK  that,  neighbour,  and  you  will  tell  tales 
of  it." 

And  drop  by  drop,  with  the  minute  care  of  a 
lapidary  counting  pearls,  the  cure"  of  Graveson 
poured  me  out  a  glassful  of  a  green,  gilded, 
warm,  sparkling,  exquisite  liqueur.  My  stomach 
was  all  sunlit  by  it. 

"  That  is  the  elixir  of  Pere  Gaucher,  the  joy  and 
health  of  our  Provence,"  added  the  worthy  man 
with  a  triumphant  air.  "  It  is  made  at  the  convent 
of  the  Premontres,  two  leagues  from  your  mill. 
Isn't  it  worth  all  the  chartreuse  in  the  world?  If 
you  only  knew  how  amusing  it  is,  the  history  of 
that  elixir !  Listen,  and  I  will  tell  it  to  you." 

Then,  very  artlessly  and  without  the  slightest 
malice,  sitting  there  in  the  dining-room  of  his  par- 
sonage, so  innocent  and  so  calm,  surrounded  by 
the  Way  of  the  Cross  in  little  pictures  and  his  white 
curtains  starched  like  a  surplice,  the  abbe"  told 
me  the  following  rather  sceptical  and  irreverent 
narrative  after  the  style  of  a  tale  of  Erasmus 
or  d'Assoucy :  — 

Twenty  years  ago  the  Prdmontres,  or  rather  "  the 
White  Fathers"  as  they  are  called  in  Provence, 


160  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

had  fallen  into  great  poverty.  If  you  had  seen 
their  house  in  those  days  you  would  have  grieved 
over  it. 

The  great  wall  and  the  Pacome  tower,  were  dis- 
appearing in  fragments.  All  around  the  cloister, 
overgrown  with  grass,  the  columns  were  splitting 
and  the  stone  saints  crumbling  in  their  niches. 
Not  a  window  left;  not  a  door  that  closed. 
Through  the  yards,  in  the  chapels,  the  Rhone 
wind  blew  as  it  does  in  Camargue,  extinguishing 
the  tapers,  bending  the  lead  of  the  sashes,  driving 
the  water  from  the  holy  basins.  But,  saddest  of 
all,  was  the  steeple  of  the  convent,  silent  as  an 
empty  pigeon-house;  and  the  fathers,  for  want 
of  money  to  buy  them  a  bell,  were  forced  to  ring 
for  matins  with  wooden  castanets. 

Poor  White  Fathers !  I  can  see  them  now  in 
the  procession  of  the  Fete-Dieu,  defiling  sadly  in 
their  ragged  cloaks,  pale,  thin,  fed  on  pumpkins 
and  water-melons ;  and  behind  them  Monseigneur 
the  abbot,  coming  along  with  his  head  down, 
ashamed  to  show  in  the  sun  his  tarnished  cross 
and  his  white  woollen  mitre,  all  moth-eaten.  The 
ladies  of  the  Confraternity  wept  for  pity  in  the 
ranks,  and  the  portly  standard-bearers  scoffed 
among  themselves  under  their  breaths  as  they 
pointed  to  those  poor  monks :  — 

"  Starlings  get  thin  when  they  live  in  flocks." 

The  fact  is,  the  unfortunate  White  Fathers  had 
themselves  begun  to  ask  whether  it  were  not  better 
to  break  up  the  community,  and  each  take  his  flight 
alone  through  the  world  in  search  of  a  living. 


The  Elixir  of  Pere  Gaucher.         1 6 1 

One  day,  when  this  grave  question  was  being 
discussed  by  the  Chapter,  some  one  entered  and 
announced  to  the  prior  that  Frere  Gaucher  asked 
to  be  heard  before  the  council.  You  must  know, 
to  guide  you,  that  Frere  Gaucher  was  the  cattle- 
keeper  of  the  convent;  that  is  to  say,  he  spent 
his  days  going  from  arcade  to  arcade  of  the  clois- 
ters, driving  before  him  two  emaciated  cows  to 
browse  upon  the  grass  in  the  cracks  of  the  pave- 
ment. Brought  up  till  he  was  twelve  years  old  by 
an  old  crazy  woman  of  the  region,  who  was  called 
Tante  Be"gon,  received  at  that  age  into  the  con- 
vent, the  luckless  lad  had  never  learned  anything 
except  how  to  drive  his  beasts  and  say  his  Pater- 
noster ;  and  the  latter  he  said  in  Proven£al,  for  his 
brain  and  his  mind  were  as  hard  and  dull  as  a 
leaden  dirk.  Fervent  Christian,  however,  though 
a  little  visionary;  living  with  comfort  in  a  hair 
shirt,  and  flagellating  himself  with  robust  convic- 
tion, and  with  such  an  arm ! 

When  he  was  seen  to  enter  the  Chapter  room, 
simple  and  stolid,  bowing  to  the  assembly  with  his 
leg  behind  him,  prior,  canons  and  bursar  they  all 
began  to  laugh.  That  was  usually  the  effect  pro- 
duced, wherever  seen,  of  that  good,  kind  face  with 
its  grizzled  goat's-beard  and  its  rather  crazy  eyes. 
Frere  Gaucher  himself  was  unmoved. 

"  My  Reverends,"  he  said  in  his  simple  way, 
twisting  his  chaplet  of  olive-stones,  "  it  is  a  true 
saying  that  empty  casks  hum  loudest.  Would  you 
believe  it,  by  dint  of  digging  into  my  poor  head, 
which  was  hollow  enough  already,  I  believe  I  have 

ii 


1 64  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

window  of  the  portal,  he  slid  down  very  hastily, 
terrified,  on  catching  sight  of  Pere  Gaucher,  with 
a  necromantic  beard,  stooping  over  his  boilers, 
hydrometer  in  hand,  and,  all  around  him,  retorts 
of  rose-marble,  gigantic  stills,  coils  of  crystal  pipe, 
—  a  fantastic  medley  which  flamed  like  witchcraft 
through  the  red  glare  of  the  painted  window. 

At  close  of  day,  while  the  last  Angelus  was 
ringing,  the  door  of  this  place  of  mystery  opened 
discreetly,  and  the  Reverend  took  his  way  to  the 
church  for  evening  service.  'Twas  a  sight  to  see 
the  greeting  he  received  as  he  crossed  the  monas- 
tery !  The  brethren  lined  up  in  hedges  along  his 
way,  whispering :  — 

"  Hush  !  he  knows  the  secret !   .  .  " 

The  bursar  followed  and  spoke  to  him  with 
bowed  head.  In  the  midst  of  all  this  adulation  the 
worthy  father  advanced,  mopping  his  forehead,  his 
three-cornered  shovel  hat  tipped  back  around  his 
head  like  a  halo,  while  he  himself  looked  com- 
placently about  him  on  the  great  courtyards  now 
full  of  orange-trees,  the  blue  slate  roofs  where  the 
new  vanes  were  twirling,  and  the  cloister  —  daz- 
zlingly  white  between  its  elegant  and  floriated 
columns  —  where  the  canons  in  their  new  gowns 
filed  along,  two  and  two  with  placid  faces. 

"  It  is  to  me  that  they  owe  it  all !  "  thought  the 
Reverend,  and  every  time  he  did  so,  the  thought 
sent  puffs  of  pride  into  his  heart. 

The  poor  man  was  well  punished  for  it.  You 
shall  see  how. 


The  Elixir  of  Pere  Gaucher.       165 

Picture  to  yourself  that  one  evening  after  the 
service  had  begun,  he  arrived  at  the  church  in  a 
state  of  extraordinary  agitation:  red,  out  of  breath, 
his  hood  awry,  and  so  bewildered  that  in  taking 
holy  water  he  soaked  his  sleeves  to  the  elbow. 
At  first  it  was  thought  to  be  emotion  at  coming 
late  to  church ;  but  when  he  was  seen  to  bow  low 
to  the  organ  and  to  the  stalls  instead  of  doing  rever- 
ence to  the  altar,  to  rush  through  the  nave  like  a 
whirlwind  and  wander  about  the  choir  unable  to 
find  his  stall,  and  then,  once  seated,  to  bow  to  right 
and  left,  smiling  beatifically,  a  murmur  of  amaze- 
ment ran  through  the  aisles.  From  breviary  to 
breviary  the  whisper  flew :  — 

"  What  is  the  matter  with  Pere  Gaucher?  What 
can  be  the  matter  with  our  Pere  Gaucher?" 

Twice  the  prior,  much  annoyed,  dropped  the 
end  of  his  crozier  on  the  pavement  to  order  silence. 
In  the  choir  the  psalms  were  going  on  all  right, 
but  the  responses  lacked  vigour. 

All  of  a  sudden,  in  the  middle  of  the  Ave  verum, 
behold  Pere  Gaucher  flinging  himself  back  in  his 
stall  and  singing  out  in  a  startling  voice :  — 

"  Dans  Paris,  il  y  a  un  P£re  Blanc, 
Patatin,  patatan,  tarabin,  taraban.  .  ." 

General  consternation.  Every  one  rose,  shout- 
ing out:  — 

"  Take  him  away  !  he  's  possessed  of  the  devil !  " 

The  canons  crossed  themselves.     Monseigneur's 

crozier  rapped  furiously.     But  Pere  Gaucher  saw 

nothing,  heard  nothing;  and  two  vigorous  monks 


1 66  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

were  forced  to  drag  him  away  through  the  little 
door  of  the  choir  fighting  like  a  maniac  and  shout- 
ing louder  than  ever  his  patatin,  taraban. 

The  next  day,  at  dawn,  the  unhappy  man  was 
on  his  knees  in  the  prior's  oratory,  making  his  meet 
culpa  with  torrents  of  tears. 

"  'T  was  the  elixir,  Monseigneur ;  the  elixir  over- 
came me,"  he  said,  striking  his  breast.  And  see- 
ing him  so  heart-broken,  so  repentant,  the  good 
prior  himself  was  much  moved. 

"  Come,  come,  Pere  Gaucher,  be  calm ;  it  will 
all  dry  up  like  dew  in  the  sun.  After  all,  the 
scandal  was  not  as  great  as  you  think.  It  is  true 
the  song  was  a  little  —  hum  !  hum  !  But  let  us 
hope  the  novices  didn't  understand  it.  And  now, 
tell  me,  please,  how  the  thing  happened.  .  .  In 
trying  the  elixir,  was  it?  You  must  have  had  too 
heavy  a  hand.  .  .  Yes,  yes,  I  understand.  Like 
Schwartz,  inventor  of  gunpowder,  you  were  the  vic- 
tim of  your  own  invention.  But  tell  me,  my  good 
friend,  is  it  really  necessary  that  you  should  try  the 
elixir  on  yourself?  " 

"  Unfortunately,  Monseigneur,  though  the  gauge 
will  give  me  the  strength  and  degree  of  the  alco- 
hol, I  can't  trust  anything  but  my  own  palate  for 
the  taste,  the  velvet  of  the  thing." 

"  Ah  !  very  well.  .  .  But  listen  to  me.  When  you 
taste  the  elixir  thus,  from  necessity,  does  it  seem  to 
you  nice?  Do  you  take  pleasure  in  tasting  it?  " 

"  Alas !  yes,  Monseigneur,"  cried  the  hapless 
father,  turning  scarlet.  "For  the  last  two  nights 


The  Elixir  of  Pere  Gaucher.       167 

it  has  had  an  aroma,  a  bouquet !  .  .  I  am  cer- 
tain it  is  the  devil  himself  who  has  played  me  this 
vile  trick.  And  that 's  why  I  am  fully  determined 
to  use  nothing  but  the  gauge  henceforth.  No 
matter  if  the  liqueur  is  not  as  good.  .  .  " 
V  "That  will  never  do,"  interrupted  the  prior 
'  eagerly.  "  We  must  n't  expose  ourselves  to  the 
discontent  of  customers.  You  must  be  careful, 
now  that  you  are  warned,  to  be  upon  your  guard. 
Come,  how  much  do  you  need  for  the  test?  Fif- 
teen, or  twenty  drops?  call  it  twenty.  The  devil 
will  be  pretty  clever  to  catch  you  with  twenty 
drops.  .  .  Besides,  to  avoid  all  accidents,  I  ex- 
empt you  from  coming  to  church  any  more.  You 
will  say  the  evening  service  by  yourself  in  the  lab- 
oratory. .  .  And  now,  go  in  peace,  my  Reverend, 
but,  above  all,  —  count  your  drops." 

Alas !  —  in  vain  did  the  poor  Reverend  count 
his  drops ;  the  demon  had  him  fast  and  would  not 
let  him  go. 

The  laboratory  heard  queer  things  ! 

In  the  daytime  all  went  well.  Pere  Gaucher 
was  calm;  he  prepared  his  chafing-dishes,  his 
distillers,  sorted  his  herbs  carefully  —  all  of  them 
Provengal  herbs,  delicate,  gray,  dentelled,  full  of 
fragrance  and  sunshine.  But  at  night,  when  the 
simples  were  infused,  and  the  elixir  was  simmering 
in  those  great  copper  basins,  the  martyrdom  of  the 
poor  man  began. 

"  Seventeen  .  .  .  eighteen  .  .  .  nineteen  .  .  . 
twenty ! .  ." 


1 68  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

The  drops  fell  one  by  one  into  the  silver-gilt 
goblet.  Those  twenty,  the  Father  swallowed  at  a 
gulp,  almost  without  any  pleasure.  It  was  only  the 
twenty-first  which  he  coveted.  Oh  !  that  twenty- 
first  drop  !  .  .  To  escape  temptation  he  went  and 
knelt  at  the  farther  end  of  the  laboratory  and  buried 
himself  in  his  paternosters.  But  the  warm  liqueur 
still  sent  up  a  little  steam  laden  with  aromatic  per- 
fumes, which  floated  around  and  brought  him, 
nolens  volens,  back  to  the  pans.  .  .  The  liqueur  was 
then  of  a  beautiful  golden  green.  .  .  Stooping 
over  it,  with  flaring  nostrils,  Pere  Gaucher  stirred 
it  gently  with  his  blowpipe  and  in  the  golden 
sparkles  that  rolled  in  that  emerald  stream  he 
seemed  to  see  the  eyes  of  Tante  Be"gon,  laughing 
and  snapping  out  as  she  looked  at  him. 

"  Come,  take  another  drop  !  " 

And  from  drop  to  drop,  the  luckless  man  ended 
by  filling  his  goblet  to  the  brim.  Then,  overcome 
at  last,  he  let  himself  fall  into  a  big  arm-chair,  and 
there,  helpless  in  body,  with  eyelids  half-closed, 
he  sipped  his  sin  slowly,  saying  to  himself  in  whis- 
pered tones  with  delicious  remorse  :  — 

"  Ah  !   I  Ve  damned  myself —  I  'm  damned." 

The  worst  of  it  was  that  at  the  bottom  of  that 
diabolical  elixir  he  found,  by  I  don't  know  what 
witchcraft,  all  the  vile  songs  of  Tante  Begon,  and 
among  them,  invariably,  the  famous  rondo  of  the 
White  Fathers :  Patatin,  patatan. 

Imagine  what  confusion  the  next  day  when  his 
cell  neighbours  would  say,  maliciously :  — 

"  Hey !  hey !   Pere  Gaucher,  you  had  grasshop- 


"  Overcome  at  last,  he  let  himself  fall  into  a  big 
arm-chair." 


The  Elixir  of  Pere  Gaucher.       169 

pers   in  your  head   when  you  went   to   bed   last 
night." 

Then  followed  tears,  despair,  fasts,  hair-shirts, 
and  flagellations.  But  nothing  availed  against  the 
demon  of  that  elixir.  Every  evening  at  the  same 
hour  the  demoniacal  possession  was  renewed. 

During  this  time,  orders  rained  on  the  monastery 
like  a  benediction.  They  came  from  Ntmes,  Aix, 
Avignon,  Marseille.  Day  by  day  the  place  as- 
sumed, more  and  more,  the  air  of  a  manufactory. 
There  were  packing  brothers,  labelling  broth- 
ers, corresponding  brothers,  and  carting  brothers. 
God's  service  lost,  this  way  and  that,  a  good  many 
strokes  of  the  bell ;  but  the  poor  of  the  region  lost 
nothing  at  all,  I  can  tell  you  that. 

However,  one  fine  Sunday  morning,  just  as  the 
bursar  was  reading  to  the  assembled  Chapter  his 
account  for  the  end  of  the  year,  and  while  all  the 
good  canons  were  listening  with  sparkling  eyes  and 
smiles  upon  their  lips,  Pere  Gaucher  burst  in  upon 
the  conference,  crying  out :  — 

"  Enough,  enough  !  I  '11  do  it  no  more  !  Give 
me  back  my  cows." 

"What's  the  matter,  Pere  Gaucher?"  asked  the 
prior,  who  suspected  what  it  was. 

"  What's  the  matter,  Monseigneur?  Why  this: 
that  I  am  on  the  road  to  a  fine  eternity  of  flames 
and  pitchforks.  The  matter  is  that  I  drink,  and 
drink  like  a  wretch  —  " 

"  But  I  told  you  to  count  your  drops." 

"  Count  my  drops,  indeed  !     It  is  goblets  I  count 


1 70  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

by  now.  .  .  Yes,  my  Reverends,  I  Ve  come  to 
that.  .  .  Three  flasks  a  night.  .  .  You  see  for 
yourselves  it  can't  go  on.  .  .  Therefore,  make  the 
elixir  by  whom  you  will.  May  God's  fire  burn  me 
if  I  touch  it  again." 

The  Chapter  did  not  laugh  this  time. 

"  But,  unhappy  man,  you  will  ruin  us,"  cried 
the  bursar,  flourishing  his  big  book. 

"  Do  you  prefer  that  I  should  damn  myself?  " 

On  that  the  prior  rose. 

"  My  Reverends,"  he  said,  extending  his  hand- 
some white  hand  on  which  shone  the  pastoral  ring. 
"  There  is  a  way  to  arrange  all  this.  .  .  It  is  in 
the  evening,  is  it  not,  my  dear  son,  that  the  demon 
tempts  you?" 

"Yes,  Monseigneur,  regularly,  every  evening. 
So  that  now,  when  evening  comes,  I  have,  saving 
your  presence,  great  sweats,  like  Capitou's  donkey 
when  she  sees  her  load." 

"  Well,  be  comforted.  In  future,  every  even- 
ing at  service-time,  we  will  recite  on  your  behalf 
the  orison  of  Saint  Augustine,  to  which  plen- 
ary indulgence  is  attached.  With  that,  whatever 
happens,  you  are  safe.  It  is  absolution  during 
the  sin."  ' 

"  Oh  !  if  that  is  so,  thank  you,  Monseigneur." 

And  without  another  word  Pere  Gaucher  re- 
turned to  his  distillery  as  gay  as  a  lark. 

From  that  moment,  every  evening  at  the  end 
of  complines,  the  officiating  priest  never  failed  to 
say:— - 

"  Let  us  pray  for  our  poor  Pere  Gaucher,  who 


The  Elixir  of  Pere  Gaucher.       171 

is  sacrificing  his  soul  for  the  interests  of  the  com- 
munity :    Oremtts,  Domine  .  .  ." 

And  while  over  all  the  white  hoods  prostrate 
in  the  shadows  of  the  nave  Saint  Augustine's 
prayer  passed  quivering,  like  a  little  breeze  over 
snow,  on  the  other  side  of  the  convent,  behind  the 
glowing  windows  of  the  laboratory  Pere  Gaucher 
could  be  heard  singing  at  the  top  of  his  lungs :  — 

"  Dans  Paris  il  y  a  un  Pere  Blanc, 
Patatin,  patatan,  taraban,  tarabin  ; 
Dans  Paris  il  y  a  un  Pere  Blanc 
Qui  fait  danser  des  moinettes, 
Trin,  trin,  trin,  dans  un  jardin 
Qui  fait  danser  des  —  " 

Here  the  good  father  stopped,  terrified. 
"  Mercy  upon   me !    suppose   my   parishioners 
were  to  overhear  that !  " 


172  Letters  from  My  Mill. 


IN   CAMARGUE. 
TO  MY  FRIEND  TlMOLEON  AMBROY. 

I. 
THE  DEPARTURE. 

GREAT  excitement  at  the  chateau.  A  messenger 
has  just  brought  a  line  from  the  gamekeeper,  half 
in  French,  half  in  Provencal,  announcing  that 
already  three  or  four  flocks  of  gallons  and  char- 
lottines  have  passed,  and  that  birds  of  prime  were 
not  lacking.  From  that  instant  everybody  had 
the  fever.  One  got  ready  the  cartridges,  another 
tried  on  the  leggings.  In  large  baskets,  carefully 
handled  on  account  of  the  bottles  wrapped  in 
straw,  provisions  were  heaped,  heaped,  as  if  we 
were  starting  for  the  desert.  At  last,  all  was 
ready.  One  morning,  in  a  four  o'clock  dawn,  the 
break  drew  up  before  the  portico. 

In  the  yards,  only  half  awake,  the  dogs  were 
leaping  with  joy  and  pressing  against  the  railings 
at  sight  of  the  guns.  Old  Miracle,  the  dean  of  the 
kennels,  Ramette,  Miraclet,  take  their  places  be- 
tween our  legs,  and  presently  we  are  bowling  along 
the  road  to  Aries,  a  little  dusty  and  a  little  barren 
on  this  December  morning  when  the  pallid  verdure 


In  Camargue. 

of  the  olive-trees  is  scarcely  visible,  and  the  crude 
green  of  the  scarlet  oak  looks  unreal  and  wintry. 
The  stables  are  all  astir.  Risers  before  dawn  are 
lighting  up  the  windows  of  the  farmhouses ;  and 
beneath  the  arches  of  the  abbey  of  Montmajour 
ospreys,  still  torpid  with  sleep,  flap  their  wings 
among  the  ruins.  Already  we  are  meeting  old 
peasant-women  trotting  slowly  to  market  on  their 
donkeys.  They  come  from  Ville-des-Baux.  Six 
full  leagues  to  sit  an  hour  upon  the  steps  of  Saint- 
Trophyme  and  sell  their  little  bunches  of  simples 
gathered  on  the  mountain  ! 

And  now  here  we  are  at  the  ramparts  of  Aries ; 
low  crenelated  ramparts,  such  as  we  see  in  old 
engravings  where  warriors  armed  with  lances  ap- 
pear above  battlements  that  are  smaller  than  they. 
We  crossed  at  a  gallop  the  marvellous  little  town, 
one  of  the  most  picturesque  in  France  with  its 
carved  and  rounded  balconies  overhanging  the 
roadway  almost  to  the  centre  of  the  narrow  street, 
and  its  old  black  houses  with  the  little  Moorish  por- 
tals, low  and  pointed,  which  carry  you  back  to  the 
days  of  William  Short-Nose  and  the  Saracens. 

At  this  hour  no  one  is  in  the  streets.  The 
quay  of  the  Rhone  alone  is  lively.  The  steamer 
that  plies  to  the  Camargue  is  puffing  at  the  foot 
of  the  steps,  ready  to  be  off.  "  Men  of  all  work  " 
in  jackets  of  a  sort  of  brown  drugget,  girls  from 
the  Roquette  going  to  hire  themselves  out  on  the 
farms,  went  on  board  when  we  did,  laughing  and 
chattering.  Under  the  long,  brown,  and  hooded 
mantle,  drawn  close  because  of  the  sharp  morning 


1 74  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

air,  the  tall  Arlesian  head-dress  gives  a  small  and 
graceful  look  to  the  head,  with  a  touch  of  pretty 
sauciness  and  a  desire  to  toss  it,  as  if  to  fling  the 
laugh  or  the  jest  still  farther.  .  .  The  bell  rings ;  we 
start.  With  the  triple  speed  of  the  Rhone,  the  screw, 
and  the  mistral  the  two  shores  unfold  themselves 
rapidly.  On  one  side  is  Crau,  an  arid,  stony  plain. 
On  the  other  the  Camargue,  greener,  and  con- 
tinuing to  the  sea  its  short  grass  and  its  marshes 
full  of  reeds. 

From  time  to  time  the  vessel  stopped  near  a 
wharf,  to  right  or  left,  "  to  empire  or  kingdom," 
as  was  said  in  the  middle-ages,  in  the  days  of  the 
Kingdom  of  Aries,  and  as  the  old  mariners  of  the 
Rhone  still  say.  At  each  wharf,  a  white  farm- 
house and  cluster  of  trees.  The  labourers  go 
ashore  with  their  tools,  the  women,  baskets  on 
their  arms,  pass  erect  down  the  gangway.  Toward 
the  empire  or  toward  the  kingdom,  little  by 
little  the  boat  empties;  and  by  the  time  it  arrives 
at  Mas-de-Giraud,  where  we  landed,  there  was 
scarcely  any  one  on  board. 

The  Mas-de-Giraud  is  an  old  farm-house  of  the 
Seigneurs  of  Barbentane,  which  we  now  entered  to 
await  the  arrival  of  the  gamekeeper,  who  was  to 
fetch  us  at  that  point.  In  the  lofty  kitchen,  labour- 
ers, vineyard-dressers,  shepherds  were  at  table; 
grave,  silent,  eating  slowly  and  served  by  women 
who  only  ate  after  them.  Soon  the  keeper  ap- 
peared with  the  carriole.  True  type  a  la  Feni- 
more,  trapper  on  earth  and  water,  fishkeeper  and 
gamekeeper,  the  people  of  the  country  round 


In  Camargue.  175 

called  him  "  lou  RoudeTrou "  \le  rddeur,  the 
prowler]  because  he  was  always  to  be  seen  in  the 
mists  of  dawn  or  the  twilight  hour  on  watch,  hid- 
den among  the  bushes  or  else  motionless  in  his 
little  boat,  employed  in  observing  his  nets  on  the 
clairs  [the  ponds]  and  the  roubines  [canals  for 
irrigation].  It  was  perhaps  this  business  of  per- 
petual watching  that  made  him  so  silent,  so  self- 
contained.  Still,  while  the  little  carriole  loaded 
with  guns  and  baskets  rolled  along  in  front  of  us, 
he  gave  us  news  of  the  hunting,  the  number  of 
passing  flocks,  and  the  places  where  the  migratory 
birds  had  alighted.  As  we  talked  we  were  ad- 
vancing deeper  into  the  country. 

The  cultivated  land  once  passed,  we  found  our- 
selves in  the  heart  of  the  wild  Camargue.  As  far 
as  the  eye  could  reach  among  the  pastures, 
marshes  and  irrigating  streams  glittered  through 
the  herbage.  Bunches  of  reeds  and  tamarisks  lay 
like  islands  on  the  bosom  of  a  calm  sea.  No  tall 
trees.  The  uniform  aspect  of  the  vast  plain  is 
unbroken.  Here  and  there  were  cattle-sheds  and 
sheepfolds,  stretches  of  low  roofs  almost  level  with 
the  ground.  The  scattered  herds  lying  on  the 
salty  grass,  or  the  flocks  pressing  closely  round 
the  russet  cape  of  the  shepherd,  did  not  interrupt 
the  great  uniformity,  diminished  as  they  were  by 
the  infinite  space  of  blue  horizons  and  the  open 
sky.  Like  the  sea,  uniform  in  spite  of  its  waves, 
the  plain  conveys  a  sense  of  solitude,  of  immensity, 
increased  by  the  mistral,  which  blows  without  re- 
laxing and  without  obstacle  and  by  its  powerful 


1 76  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

breath  seems  to  flatten  and  so  widen  the  land- 
scape. Everything  bends  before  it.  The  smallest 
shrubs  keep  the  imprint  of  its  passage,  and  con- 
tinue twisted  and  bent  toward  the  south  in  an 
attitude  of  flight. 


II. 

THE  HUT. 

A  ROOF  of  reeds,  walls  of  reeds,  dry  and  yellow, 
that  is  the  hut.  This  is  the  name  we  give  to  our 
hunting-box.  Type  of  a  Camargue  house,  it  has 
but  one  room,  lofty,  vast,  and  no  window,  getting 
its  light  from  a  glass  door,  closed  at  night  with 
solid  shutters.  Along  the  great  plastered  walls 
freshly  whitewashed,  racks  await  the  guns,  game- 
bags,  and  marsh  boots.  At  the  farther  end  five  or 
six  cots  are  ranged  around  a  real  mast  planted  in 
the  ground  and  rising  to  the  roof,  which  it  sup- 
ports. At  night,  when  the  mistral  blows  and  the 
house  cracks  everywhere,  and  the  wind  brings 
with  it  the  roar  of  the  distant  sea,  increasing  and 
swelling  the  sound,  one  might  think  one's  self 
lying  in  the  cabin  of  a  boat. 

But  in  the  afternoon  it  is  that  the  hut  is  charm- 
ing. On  our  fine  days  of  Southern  winter,  I  like 
to  be  left  all  alone  near  the  high  chimney  where  a 
few  roots  of  tamarisk  are  smouldering.  Under 
the  assaults  of  the  mistral  or  the  tramontane,  the 
door  bursts  in,  the  reeds  cry  out,  and  all  these 


In  Camargue.  177 

little  shocks  are  a  mere  echo  of  the  great  agita- 
tions of  Nature  going  on  around  me.  The  winter 
sun  lashed  by  the  wind  scatters  itself,  joins  its 
beams,  and  again  disperses.  Great  shadows  flit 
beneath  a  glorious  blue  sky.  Light  comes  in 
jerks,  noises  also,  and  the  bells  of  the  flocks  heard 
suddenly,  then  forgotten,  lost  in  the  wind,  return 
to  sing  at  the  shaken  door  with  the  charm  of  a 
chorus.  The  exquisite  moment  is  the  twilight 
hour,  just  before  the  hunters  come  back.  Then 
the  wind  calms  down.  I  go  out  for  an  instant. 
In  peace  the  great  red  sun  descends,  flaming,  yet 
without  heat.  The  night  falls;  it  brushes  me  in 
passing  with  its  damp  black  wing.  Over  there,  at 
the  level  of  the  soil,  the  flash  of  a  gun  runs  along 
with  the  light  of  a  ruddy  star,  brightened  by  the 
environing  darkness.  For  the  rest  of  the  day,  life 
hastens.  A  long  triangle  of  ducks  fly  low,  as  if 
they  meant  to  take  to  earth,  but  the  hut,  where  the 
lantern  is  now  lighted,  keeps  them  away.  He  who 
heads  the  column  draws  in  his  neck  and  mounts, 
while  others  behind  him  utter  savage  and  angry 
cries. 

Presently  an  immense  pattering  is  heard  like  a 
noise  of  rain.  Thousands  of  sheep,  called  in  by 
the  shepherd,  and  driven  by  the  dogs  whose  con- 
fused gallop  and  panting  breath  can  be  heard,  are 
hurrying  to  the  fold,  timid  and  undisciplined.  I 
am  invaded,  brushed  against,  surrounded  by  this 
cloud  of  curly  wool,  all  bleating ;  a  perfect  mob,  in 
which  the  shepherds  and  their  shadows  seem  borne 
along  in  a  bounding  flood.  Behind  the  flock  come 

12 


1 78  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

well  known  voices,  joyous  voices.  The  hut  be- 
comes animated,  noisy.  The  roots  flame.  They 
laugh  the  most  who  are  most  weary.  It  is  a 
laughter  of  happy  fatigue,  guns  in  the  corner,  the 
great  boots  flung  away  pell-mell,  the  gamebags 
emptied,  and  close  beside  them,  plumages,  red, 
golden,  green,  silvery,  all  stained  with  blood.  The 
table  is  laid,  and  in  the  fumes  of  a  good  eel-soup 
silence  reigns;  the  silence  of  robust  appetites, 
interrupted  only  by  the  ferocious  growls  of  the 
dogs  lapping  their  porringers  before  the  door. 

The  evening  will  be  short.  Already  no  one  is 
left  but  the  keeper  and  myself  beside  the  fire,  and 
that  is  blinking.  We  talk,  or  rather,  we  toss  to  each 
other,  now  and  then,  the  half-words  that  charac- 
terize the  peasantry,  interjections  almost  Indian, 
short  and  quickly  extinct,  like  the  sparkles  of  the 
now  consumed  roots.  At  last  the  keeper  rises, 
lights  his  lantern,  and  I  hear  his  heavy  step  going 
out  into  the  darkness. 


III. 
A  L'ESPERE!     (ON  THE  WATCH.) 

L'ESPERE  !  —  hope  !  —  what  a  pretty  name  by 
which  to  describe  the  watch,  the  expectation  of 
the  ambushed  huntsman  and  those  undecided  hours 
when  everything  waits,  hopes}  hesitates  between 
day  and  night.  The  watch  of  the  morning  a  little 
before  sunrise,  the  watch  of  the  evening  in  the 


In  Camargue.  179 

twilight !  It  is  the  latter  that  I  prefer,  especially 
in  this  marshy  region,  where  the  ponds  hold  the 
light  so  long. 

Sometimes  the  watch  is  kept  in  the  negochin,  a 
very  small  boat,  narrow,  without  keel,  and  rolling  at 
the  slightest  motion.  Sheltered  by  the  reeds,  the 
sportsman  watches  for  the  ducks  lying  in  his  boat, 
above  which  nothing  is  seen  but  the  visor  of  a  cap, 
the  muzzle  of  a  gun,  and  the  head  of  a  dog  snuff- 
ing the  wind,  snapping  at  the  gnats,  or  else,  with 
his  big  paws  extended,  hanging  over  the  side  of 
the  boat  and  filling  it  with  water.  That  watch  is 
too  complicated  for  my  inexperience.  So  I  usu- 
ally go  to  the  esphe  on  foot,  paddling  through 
the  marsh  in  those  enormous  boots  that  are  cut 
from  the  whole  length  of  the  leather.  I  walk 
slowly,  cautiously,  for  fear  of  being  sucked  in.  I 
push  through  the  reeds  full  of  briny  odours  where 
the  frogs  are  hopping. 

At  last  here  's  an  island  of  tamarisks,  a  spot  of 
dry  earth,  where  I  install  myself.  The  keeper,  to 
do  me  honour,  leaves  me  his  dog,  a  huge  dog  of 
the  Pyrenees  with  a  great  white  coat,  hunter  and 
fisher  of  the  highest  order,  whose  presence  does 
not  fail  to  intimidate  me  slightly.  When  a  water- 
fowl passes  within  aim  of  my  gun  he  has  a  certain 
sarcastic  way  of  looking  at  me ;  throwing  back, 
with  an  artist's  toss  of  the  head,  the  long,  limp 
ears  that  overhang  his  eyes ;  then  he  poses  to  a 
point  with  a  quivering  motion  of  his  tail  and  a 
whole  pantomime  of  impatience,  which  says  to  me, 
"  Fire !  Come,  fire !  "  I  fire  and  miss.  Then, 


i8o  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

lying  down  at  full  length,  he  yawns  and  stretches 
with  a  weary,  discouraged,  and  insolent  air. 

Well,  yes  !  I  admit  that  I  am  a  bad  sportsman. 
The  watch,  for  me,  means  the  falling  day,  the  fad- 
ing light  taking  refuge  in  the  water,  in  the  ponds 
that  gleam,  polishing  to  silvery  tones  the  gray 
tints  of  a  sombre  sky.  I  love  that  smell  of  water, 
the  mysterious  rustle  of  insects  in  the  reeds,  the 
little  murmur  of  the  long  leaves  waving.  From 
time  to  time  a  sad  note  passes,  rolling  through 
the  sky  like  the  rumbling  sounds  in  a  sea-shell. 
It  is  the  bittern,  plunging  into  the  water  his  im- 
mense, fisher-bird's  beak  and  snorting — rrrououou  ! 
Flocks  of  cranes  file  above  my  head.  I  hear  the 
rustle  of  wings,  the  ruffling  of  down  in  the  clear 
air ;  then  nothing.  It  is  night,  profound  darkness, 
except  for  a  gleam  still  lingering  on  the  water. 

Suddenly  I  am  conscious  of  a  quiver,  a  sort  of  ner- 
vous sensation,  as  if  some  one  were  behind  me.  I 
turn,  and  see  the  companion  of  beautiful  nights,  the 
moon,  a  large  moon,  quite  round,  rising  gently  with 
an  ascending  motion,  at  first  very  perceptible,  then 
apparently  diminishing  as  she  leaves  the  horizon. 

Already  the  first  ray  is  distinct  beside  me,  and 
another  is  a  little  farther  off.  ...  Presently  the 
whole  swamp  is  illuminated.  The  smallest  tuft  of 
grass  casts  its  shadow.  The  watch  is  over,  the 
birds  see  us ;  we  return.  We  walk  in  the  midst  of 
an  inundation,  a  dust,  of  vaporous  blue  light,  and 
every  step  in  the  pools  and  the  marches  scatters 
the  stars  and  the  moon-rays  which  lie  in  the  water 
to  its  depths. 


In  Camargue.  181 


IV. 

THE  RED  AND  THE  WHITE. 

CLOSE  to  us,  within  gunshot  of  the  hut  is  an- 
other hut  which  resembles  ours,  but  is  more  rustic. 
It  is  there  that  the  gamekeeper  lives  with  his  wife 
and  elder  children.  The  daughter  attends  to  the 
feeding  of  the  men  and  mends  the  fishing-nets; 
the  son  helps  his  father  to  take  up  the  seines  and 
watch  the  sluices  of  the  ponds.  The  two  younger 
children  are  at  Aries  with  their  grandmother,  and 
there  they  will  stay  till  they  have  learned  to  read  and 
have  made  their  bon  jour  [good  day,  first  commun- 
ion] ;  for  here  their  parents  are  too  far  from  church 
and  school,  and  besides,  the  air  of  the  Camargue 
would  not  be  good  for  the  little  ones.  The  fact  is 
that  in  summer,  when  the  marshes  dry  up  and 
the  white  clay  of  the  pools  cracks  in  the  great 
heat,  the  island  is  scarcely  habitable. 

I  saw  that  once  in  the  month  of  August  when  I 
came  to  shoot  young  wild-duck;  and  I  shall  never 
forget  the  sad,  ferocious  aspect  of  the  burnt-up 
landscape.  From  place  to  place  the  empty  ponds 
smoked  in  the  sun  like  monstrous  vats,  keeping 
low  at  their  bottom  a  remainder  of  water,  of  life, 
which  stirred  with  a  crawling  swarm  of  salaman- 
ders, spiders,  and  water-beetles  seeking  for  damp 
spots.  At  the  keeper's  house  all  were  shivering, 


1 32  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

each  had  the  fever;  and  it  was  really  piteous  to 
see  those  drawn,  yellow  faces,  the  black-circled 
eyes  of  those  poor  unfortunates,  compelled  to  drag 
themselves  about  for  three  months  under  an  inex- 
orable sun  which  burned  the  sufferers  but  did  not 
warm  them.  Dreary  and  painful  life  is  that  of  a 
gamekeeper  in  Camargue !  This  one  at  least  had 
his  wife  and  children  with  him ;  but  two  leagues 
farther  on,  in  a  marsh,  lives  a  horse-keeper,  abso- 
lutely alone  from  one  end  of  the  year  to  the  other 
—  a  Robinson-Crusoe  existence.  In  his  hut  of 
reeds,  which  he  built  himself,  there  is  not  a  utensil 
he  did  not  make,  from  the  braided  osier  hammock, 
the  fireplace  of  three  stones,  the  roots  of  tama- 
risk cut  into  stools,  to  even  the  lock  and  key  of 
white  wood  which  close  this  singular  habitation. 

The  man  is  as  strange  as  his  dwelling.  He  is  a 
species  of  philosopher,  silent  as  a  hermit,  shelter- 
ing his  peasant  distrust  of  every  one  behind  his 
bushy  eyebrows.  When  he  is  not  in  the  pastures 
you  will  find  him  seated  before  his  door,  decipher- 
ing slowly,  with  childish  and  touching  application, 
one  of  those  little  pink,  blue,  or  yellow  pamphlets 
which  wrap  the  pharmaceutical  phials  he  procures 
for  his  horses.  Though  the  huts  are  near  together, 
our  keeper  and  he  never  visit  each  other.  They 
even  avoid  meeting.  One  day  I  asked  the  rou- 
de'irou  the  reason  of  this  antipathy.  He  answered 
gravely :  "  On  account  of  opinions :  he  is  red ;  I 
am  white." 

So  in  this  desert,  where  solitude  might  have 
brought  them  together,  these  two  savages,  both 


In  Camargue.  183 

ignorant,  both  naYve,  these  two  herdsmen  of  The- 
ocritus, who  go  to  the  city  scarcely  once  a  year, 
and  to  whom  the  little  caffs  of  Aries,  with  their 
mirrors  and  their  gilding,  are  as  dazzling  as  the 
palace  of  the  Ptolemies,  have  found  means  to  hate 
each  other  on  account  of  their  political  convictions. 


V. 

THE  VACCARES. 

THE  finest  thing  in  the  Gamargue  is  the  Vac- 
cares.  Often,  abandoning  the  hunt,  I  go  and  sit 
on  the  shore  of  that  salt  lake,  a  little  sea  like  a  bit 
of  the  ocean  captured  and  shut  in  by  earth  and 
content  with  its  captivity.  In  place  of  the  dryness, 
the  aridity  that  casts  sadness  everywhere,  the 
Vaccares,  with  its  rather  high  banks,  green  with  a 
velvety  fine  grass,  exhibits  an  original  and  charm- 
ing flora,  centaureas,  water-trefoil,  gentians,  and 
the  pretty  saladelle,  blue  in  winter,  red  in  summer, 
which  changes  colour  with  change  of  atmosphere, 
and  in  its  ceaseless  blooming  marks  the  seasons 
with  diverse  tints. 

Towards  five  in  the  afternoon,  as  the  sun  de- 
clines, these  three  leagues  of  water,  without  a  boat, 
without  a  sail  to  limit  them,  transform  their  extent 
and  take  on  a  charming  aspect.  It  is  no  longer 
the  charm  of  the  pools  and  the  ponds  appearing 
now  and  then  in  a  dip  of  the  marly  soil,  beneath 
which  one  feels  the  water  percolating.  Here  the 


184  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

impression  is  broad  and  fine.  From  afar  this  radi- 
ance of  water  allures  great  flocks  of  divers,  bitterns, 
herons,  flamingoes  with  white  bosoms  and  rose- 
coloured  wings,  all  standing  in  line  to  fish  along  the 
shore  in  a  manner  that  exhibits  their  various  tints 
in  a  long  even  strip.  Also  the  ibis,  the  true  Egyp- 
tian ibis,  who  feel  themselves  much  at  home  in  the 
silent  landscape  beneath  that  splendid  sun.  From 
the  place  where  I  lay  I  could  hear  nothing  but  the 
water  rippling  and  the  voice  of  the  keeper,  calling 
to  his  scattered  horses  on  the  brink.  They  all  had 
resounding  names:  "Cifer!  (Lucifer)  Estello ! 
Estournello  !  "  Each  animal,  hearing  itself  called, 
came  galloping  up,  mane  streaming,  to  eat  his  oats 
from  the  hand  of  the  keeper. 

Farther  on,  still  on  the  same  shore,  was  a  vast 
herd  of  cattle  peacefully  feeding  like  the  horses. 
Now  and  then  I  could  see  above  the  clumps  of 
tamarisk  the  line  of  their  bent  backs  and  their 
small  horns  as  they  raised  their  heads.  Most  of 
these  oxen  of  the  Camargue  are  raised  to  run  in 
the  ferradesy  the  village  fetes,  and  some  have 
names  that  are  even  celebrated  in  the  circuses 
of  Provence  and  Languedoc.  Our  neighbouring 
herd  counts  among  others  the  "  Roman  "  who  has 
ripped  up  I  know  not  how  many  men  and  horses 
in  the  races  at  Nismes,  Aries,  Tarascon.  Conse- 
quently, his  comrades  have  accepted  him  as  leader. 
For  in  these  strange  herds,  the  animals  govern 
themselves  by  laws,  grouped  around  some  old  bull 
whom  they  take  for  leader.  When  a  hurricane 
falls  upon  Camargue,  terrible  in  that  great  plain 


In  Camargue.  185 

where  nothing  diverts  it,  it  is  a  sight  to  see  the 
herd  pressing  together  behind  its  leader,  all  heads 
turning  to  the  wind  their  broad  foreheads  where 
the  strength  of  the  ox  is  concentrated.  The  Pro- 
vencal herdsmen  call  that  manoeuvre  vira  la  bano 
an giscle — turning  horn  to  the  wind;  and  sorrow 
to  the  herd  that  does  not  do  so.  Blinded  by  rain, 
driven  by  wind,  the  routed  herd  turns  upon  itself, 
is  terrified,  dispersed,  and  the  distracted  animals, 
rushing  before  them  to  escape  the  tempest,  plunge 
into  the  Rhone,  the  Vaccares,  or  the  sea. 


1 86  Letters  from  My  Mill. 


BARRACK   HOMESICKNESS. 

THIS  morning,  at  the  first  gleam  of  dawn,  the 
loud  roll  of  a  drum  awoke  me  with  a  start :  Ron 
plon  plon  !  Ron  plon  plon  ! 

A  drum  among  my  pines  at  such  an  hour  !  Sin- 
gular, to  say  the  least  of  it. 

Quick,  quick,  I  jumped  out  of  bed,  and  ran  to 
open  the  door. 

No  one.  The  noise  has  stopped.  From  among 
the  wet  creepers  two  or  three  curlews  fly  out,  shak- 
ing their  wings.  A  slight  breeze  sings  in  the  leaf- 
age. To  eastward,  on  the  delicate  summit  of  the 
Alpilles  lies  a  golden  dust  from  which  the  sun  is 
slowly  issuing.  A  first  ray  touches  already  the  roof 
of  the  mill.  At  that  instant  the  drum,  invisible, 
begins  to  beat  again  in  the  covert :  Ron  —  plon 
—  plon,  plon,  plon  ! 

The  devil  take  that  ass's  skin  !  I  had  forgotten 
it.  But  who  can  the  savage  be  who  salutes  Au- 
rora in  these  woodland  wilds  with  a  drum?  In 
vain  I  looked  about  me;  I  saw  nothing  —  nothing 
but  tufts  of  lavender  and  pine-trees  racing  down- 
ward to  the  road.  In  that  thicket  there  must  be 
some  imp,  engaged  in  making  fun  of  me  —  Ariel, 
no  doubt,  or  Master  Puck.  The  scamp  has  said 
to  himself  as  he  passed  my  mill :  — 


Barrack  Homesickness.  187 

"That  Parisian  is  too  tranquil  here.  I'll  give 
him  a  serenade." 

On  which  he  takes  a  big  drum,  and  —  Ron  plon 
plon !  Ron  plon  plon !  Will  you  be  quiet,  you 
rascal  of  a  Puck?  you  '11  wake  my  grasshoppers. 

It  was  not  Puck. 

It  was  Gouguet  Francois,  called  Pistolet,  drummer 
of  the  3 1st  infantry,  off  on  a  fortnight's  furlough. 
Pistolet  is  bored  in  the  country ;  he  is  homesick, 
that  drummer,  and  when  the  village  is  willing  to 
lend  him  its  drum,  he  goes  off  to  the  woods  in 
melancholy  mood  to  beat  it  and  dream  of  his 
barracks. 

It  was  on  my  little  green  hill  that  he  had  come  to 
dream  on  this  occasion.  There  he  stands  against 
a  fir-tree,  his  drum  between  his  legs,  rejoicing  his 
heart.  Coveys  of  startled  partridges  rise  at  his  feet 
without  his  seeing  them.  The  wild  thyme  is  balmy 
about  him,  but  he  does  not  smell  it. 

Neither  does  he  notice  those  delicate  spider- 
webs  trembling  in  the  sunshine  among  the  branches, 
nor  the  spicy  pine-needles  that  skip  on  his  drum. 
Absorbed  in  his  dream  and  his  music,  he  lovingly 
watches  his  sticks  as  they  tap,  and  his  big,  silly 
face  expands  with  delight  at  each  loud  roll. 

Ron  plon  plon  !     Ron  plon  plon  ! 

"  How  fine  it  is,  our  big  barrack,  with  its  paved 
courtyard,  its  rows  of  windows,  all  in  a  line,  the 
men  in  their  forage-caps,  and  the  low  arcades 
where  the  canteens  rattle !  " 

Ron  plon  plon  !     Ron  plon  plon  ! 


1 88  Letters  from  My  Mill. 

"  Oh !  that  echoing  staircase,  the  white-washed 
corridors,  the  close  dormitory,  the  belts  that  one 
pipe-clays,  the  blacking-pots,  the  iron  bedsteads 
with  their  gray  coverlets,  the  guns  that  glitter  in 
the  rack !  " 

Ron  plon  plon  !     Ron  plon  plon  ! 

"  Oh !  the  good  days  in  the  guard-house,  the 
cards  that  stick  to  one's  fingers,  that  hideous 
queen  of  spades  with  feather  furbelows,  and  the 
old  tattered  Pigault-Lebruns  lying  round  on  the 
camp  beds." 

Ron  plon  plon  !     Ron  plon  plon  ! 

"Oh!  the  long  nights  mounting  guard  at  the 
gates  of  the  ministries,  the  chinks  in  the  sentry-box 
which  let  in  the  rain,  the  feet  that  are  always  cold, 
and  the  fine  gala  coaches  that  spatter  you  as  they 
go  by.  Oh !  that  extra  duty,  the  days  in  the 
stocks,  the  vile-smelling  bucket,  the  wooden  pillow, 
the  cold  reveille  of  a  rainy  morning,  and  the  taps 
of  a  foggy  night,  when  the  gas  is  lighted  and  the 
roll-call  brings  every  one  in  all  breathless !  " 

Ron  plon  plon  !     Ron  plon  plon  ! 

"  Oh !  the  forest  of  Vincennes,  the  white  cotton 
gloves,  the  walks  on  the  ramparts.  Oh !  the 
Barriere  de  1'ficole,  the  soldier's  girl,  the  cornet 
in  the  Salon  de  Mars,  the  absinthe  in  the  garden, 
the  secrets  between  two  hiccoughs,  the  sabres 
unsheathed,  the  sentimental  song  —  sung  with  a 
hand  on  one's  heart !  " 

Dream,  dream,  poor  man ;  it  is  not  I  who  will 
prevent  you  ;  tap  your  drum  boldly,  tap  hard  with 


Barrack  Homesickness.  189 

all  your  might.  I  have  no  right  to  think  you 
ridiculous. 

If  you  are  homesick  for  your  barrack,  have  not 
I,  I  myself,  a  longing  for  mine? 

My  Paris  pursues  me  even  here — like  yours. 
You  drum  beneath  the  pines  and  I  make  copy.  — 
Fine  Provencals  we  are,  i'  faith !  Down  there, 
in  the  barracks  of  Paris  we  regret  our  blue 
Alpilles  and  the  fresh  wild  odour  of  lavender; 
but  here,  in  the  heart  of  Provence  we  miss  our 
barracks,  and  all  that  recalls  them  to  us  is 
precious. 

Eight  o'clock  is  striking  in  the  village.  Pistolet, 
not  relinquishing  his  drumsticks,  starts  to  go  back. 
I  hear  him,  descending  through  the  pines,  still  drum- 
ming. And  I,  lying  on  the  grass,  sick  with  nos- 
talgia, I  fancy  I  see,  to  the  sound  of  the  drum  as 
it  recedes,  my  Paris,  the  whole  of  my  Paris  defiling 
among  the  firs. 

Ah  Paris !  .  .  Paris !  .  .  Forever  Paris ! 


LETTERS   TO   AN   ABSENT   ONE. 


LETTERS   TO   AN   ABSENT 
ONE. 


THE  SURRENDER. 

Written  Feb.  6,  1871. 

I  DO  not  know  what  bravura  air  they  will  sing 
to  you  in  the  theatre  at  Bordeaux  apropos  of  the 
siege  and  the  surrender  of  Paris ;  but  if  you  want 
to  know,  once  for  all,  my  sentiments  on  that 
lamentable  affair,  here  they  are  in  two  words :  — 

Our  valiant  generals  —  may  the  devil  take  them  ! 
—  defended  the  ex-capital  just  as  they  might  have 
defended  Me"zieres,  Toul,  or  Verdun,  after  a  certain 
military  code  which  on  leaving  school  each  one 
carries  under  the  lining  of  his  ke"pi :  "  Article 
I.  A  besieged  city  never  unbesieges  itself."  Yet 
they  parted  from  that  precept  and  attempted  to 
raise  the  siege. 

Remark  in  passing  that  these  same  tacticians, 
eight  days  before  the  siege,  told  us  with  adorable 
self-sufficiency  that  we  might  be  carried  by  assault, 
but  never  invested — never. 

Oh  yes  !  generals  of  the  Good  God,  we  could  be 
invested.  The  Prussians  have  broad  paws,  and 
although  Paris  has  a  big  waist  she  found  herself, 
in  less  than  a  week,  pinched  in  like  a  wasp  by  those 

13 


194          Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

old  veterans;  but  if  you  generals  had  had  the 
pluck  we  might  even  then  have  got  out  of  the 
difficulty.  Paris  is  a  giant;  and  you  ought  to 
have  let  her  fight  as  a  giant ;  you  ought  to  have 
given  freedom  to  her  genius  and  put  in  motion  all 
her  muscles.  When  the  Marne  hampered  you, 
Paris  should  have  swallowed  the  Marne.  Those 
terrible  heights  of  Chatillon,  Meudon,  Champigny, 
all  those  mills,  all  those  knolls,  the  ridiculous  and 
bloody  names  of  which  pursue  us  in  our  dreams, 
Paris,  with  one  kick,  could  have  sent  them  to 
the  moon.  It  was  a  matter  of  four  hundred 
thousand  spades  working  for  a  month  behind  a 
hundred  thousand  muskets;  but  you  would  not 
hear  of  it. 

Ah !  the  true  history  of  that  siege,  it  is  not  in 
newspapers  or  in  books  that  we  must  look  for  it ; 
we  should  go  to  the  ministry  of  war.  There  were 
fought  the  great  battles  before  Paris.  There  were 
wrecked  against  the  leathern  bucklers  of  military 
bureaucracy  all  individual  efforts,  all  good  wills,  all 
ardent  enthusiasms,  all  great  ideas  for  the  defence 
of  the  city.  It  was  pitiful  to  see  Minister  Dorian 
and  his  staff  of  the  Public  Works  so  active,  so 
intelligent,  going  from  bureau  to  bureau,  making 
himself  humble,  even  small,  and  supplicating,  with 
clasped  hands :  — 

"  For  pity's  sake,  gentlemen  of  the  War  Depart- 
ment! We  know  how  insignificant  we  are;  the 
cleverest  of  us  cannot  serve  to  even  brush  your 
Guiods  and  your  Fr6baults.  Yes,  you  are  right, 
our  engineers  are  asses,  our  contractors  under- 


The  Surrender.  195 

stand  nothing ;  but  never  mind  that,  —  do  try  our 
little  pieces  of  7  loaded  at  the  breech,  and  our 
flying  supply-waggons,  which  can  pour  hogsheads 
of  hot  coffee  and  wine  down  your  soldiers'  throats 
even  on  the  battlefield,  and  our  stationary  balloons 
which,  without  costing  you  the  life  of  a  single  man, 
can  reconnoitre  and  make  sure  whether  the  bat- 
teries on  the  Chatillon  are  really  only  stove-pipes, 
as  it  is  said  they  are." 

And  how  proud  they  were,  those  brave  Public 
Works  men,  when,  after  five  months  of  entreaty, 
efforts,  and  documents  of  all  kinds,  they  succeeded 
in  getting  to  the  front  a  few  of  those  "  pieces  of 
7  "  —  about  which  one  of  our  great  generals  said 
in  his  slightly  cracked  faubourg  voice :  — 

"  Not  so  bad,  this  commercial  artillery !  I  really 
must  see  about  buying  some." 

Too  late,  general.  The  Prussians  have  got  them 
all. 

Now,  the  end  is  come.  Paris  has  once  more 
eaten  white  bread  and  butter.  There  is  no  going 
back  to  the  past.  At  first  I  raged,  —  my  God ! 
how  I  raged,  —  but  of  late,  I  feel  within  me,  in  the 
depths  of  me,  something  relaxed,  something  rest- 
ful It  was  so  long,  my  dear  friend,  so  long,  that 
siege  !  so  agonizing,  so  monotonous  !  It  seems  to 
me  as  if  I  had  just  spent  five  months  at  sea  in 
a  dead  and  almost  continual  calm. 

And  to  think  that  for  certain  persons  those  five 
months  of  enervating  sadness  were  intoxicating  — 
a  perpetual  fete.  From  the  privates  of  the  National 
Guard,  earning  their  forty-five  sous  a  day  for  doing 


196          Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

nothing,  to  the  majors  with  seven  stripes,  construc- 
tors of  barricades  in  chambers,  ambulance  fellows 
of  Gamache,  all  shiny  with  good  meat  juice,  fan- 
tastic free-lances  parading  in  cafes  and  calling  the 
waiters  with  omnibus  whistles,  commanders  of  the 
National  Guard  billeted  with  their  mistresses  in 
the  public  apartments,  all  the  hucksters,  all  the 
tricksters,  the  dog-stealers,  the  cat-hunters,  the  sel- 
lers of  horse-hoofs,  albumen,  gelatine,  the  pigeon- 
raisers,  the  owners  of  milch  cows,  all  those  having 
notes  in  the  sheriff's  hands  and  those  who  dislike 
to  pay  their  rent,  —  to  every  one  of  them  the  end 
of  the  siege  is  desolation ;  there  is  not  a  patriotic 
thought  among  them.  Paris  free,  they  were  forced 
to  return  to  the  ranks,  to  work,  to  face  life,  to  give 
up  the  gold  lace,  the  public  apartments,  and  return 
to  their  kennels,  —  ah  !  it  was  hard. 

Certainly  I  do  not  wish  to  calumniate  the  Re- 
public. In  the  first  place,  I  do  not  yet  know  what 
it  is ;  then,  having  seen  very  closely  the  men  and 
the  things  of  the  empire,  I  have  no  right  to  cavil. 
Nevertheless,  what  has  been  going  on  around  me 
since  the  fourth  of  September  has  filled  my  soul 
with  bitterness,  and  made  me  more  sceptical  than 
ever.  All  those  that  I  knew  to  be  fools,  loafers, 
idlers,  incapables  have  come  to  the  surface  and 
found  offices.  Be  it  understood  that  I  am  not 
speaking  of  republicans  by  conviction,  faithful  men, 
men  of  the  night  before ;  they  have  had  their  turn, 
and  it  was  just ;  but  I  speak  of  the  others,  those  whom 
that  sad  empire  would  not  have  had  in  its  lowest 
offices,  —  they  are  provided  for  now,  —  even  to 


The  Surrender.  197 

that  miserable,  that  pitiable  N.  .  .  whom  we  saw 
during  the  death-struggle  of  the  late  reign  begging 
from  all  the  ministries  an  office,  no  matter  what ; 
here  he  is  now  commissary  of  police  in  a  blood- 
thirsty arrondissement. 

Another  strange  thing  is  to  see  — in  the  midst 
of  the  great  political  hurly-burly  —  the  immutabil- 
ity of  certain  men  and  certain  situations.  The 
most  complete  type  of  these  hommes-boutes  —  hu- 
man buoys,  who  float  in  all  weathers  and  come  to 
the  surface  of  the  water  no  matter  what  may  hap- 
pen —  is  the  worthy  secretary-general  of  the  ci-de- 
vant legislative  body.  All  the  journalists  of  Paris 
know  this  long  individual  with  the  livid  face,  thin 
lips,  sad  smile,  head  of  an  acrobat  and  a  beadle, 
who  is  always  to  be  seen  seated  at  a  little  table, 
above  the  tribune  and  behind  the  presidential 
chair.  I  like  to  think  that  the  place  is  a  good 
one,  for  it  is  now  more  than  thirty  years  that  the 
worthy  man  has  clung  to  it ;  it  would  need  a  bold 
wind-sweep  to  topple  him  from  that  height.  Kings 
have  gone,  empires  have  crumbled,  the  torpedoes 
of  the  republic  have  blown  the  Assembly  to  bits, 
but  the  little  table  of  M.  Valette  has  not  budged, 
and  never  will  budge. 

Talk  to  me  of  in-dis-pen-sa-ble  men !  He  is 
one;  or  at  least  he  makes  us  believe  he  is,  and 
that  is  why  he  is  so  strong.  It  seems  that  no  one 
in  France,  not  even  M.  Thiers,  knows  parliamentary 
law  as  he  does.  So  that  if  he  were  not  here  the 
parliamentary  machine  would  be  unable  to  perform 
its  functions.  Outside  of  those  terrible  rules  and 


198  Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

regulations,  as  to  which  he  is  pitiless,  he  is  a  man 
all  suppleness  and  all  concession.  "  If  your  Excel- 
lency desires  it,"  he  says  in  a  sugary  voice,  bowing 
to  the  ground  before  M.  Palikao.  This  was  said 
on  September  4,  at  midday.  September  6,  at  the 
same  hour,  he  entered  the  salons  of  the  Place 
Beauvau  and,  with  the  same  obsequious  smile,  the 
same  bend  of  his  courtier  hips,  he  said  to  M.  Gam- 
betta :  "  If  your  Excellency  will  kindly  permit  me." 
And  this  time  —  as  ever  before  —  they  have  left 
him  tranquil  at  his  little  table,  with  the  keys  of 
the  Palais  in  his  pocket,  a  picket  of  the  National 
Guard  before  his  door  to  do  him  honour ;  and  for 
the  last  five  months  he  has  had  nothing  to  do  but 
to  pick  violets  on  the  beautiful  lawns  of  the  presi- 
dency and  draw  his  pay  regularly.  Now  that  the 
Chamber  has  opened  at  Bordeaux  he  is  down  there, 
smiling  as  usual,  at  his  little  table  behind  the  presi- 
dential arm-chair. 

A  saying  of  this  amiable  personage  will  complete 
his  portrait.  One  of  his  subordinates  attempted 
on  some  occasion  to  oppose  him,  openly  relying  on 
the  protection  of  M.  Schneider,  then  president  of 
the  legislative  body.  M.  Valette  summoned  the 
poor  devil  into  his  cabinet,  and  there,  gently  and 
without  anger,  he  slipped  into  him  between  skin 
and  flesh,  as  they  say,  this  memorable  remark : — 

"  Take  care  what  you   are  about,  my  friend ; 
presidents  are  not  eternal." 

M.  Valette  is  eternal. 

He  is  called  "  The  Administration." 


T/ie  Dictators.  199 


THE  DICTATORS. 

Do  you  remember  No.  7  rue  de  Tournon  and 
that  famous  H6tel  du  Se"nat  where  we  have  eaten 
so  many  Reims  biscuits  in  the  dust?  I  passed 
before  it  this  morning  on  my  way  to  look  at  the 
bombarded  quarter.  The  house  is  still  the  same ; 
the  courtyard  as  black  and  damp,  the  great  win- 
dows of  the  dining-room  as  cloudy  as  they  were 
a  dozen  years  ago,  but  the  room  itself  seemed  to 
me  less  noisy. 

What  a  racket  was  there  —  in  our  day  —  at  din- 
ner-time !  Always  a  dozen  Southern  students  — 
of  the  worst  South  —  with  rusty  beards  too  black, 
too  shiny,  shrill  tones,  extravagant  gestures,  and 
long,  drooping  noses  which  gave  them  the  look 
of  a  horse's  head.  Heavens !  how  insufferable 
those  young  Gascons  were  !  What  excitement  out 
of  nothing,  what  silliness,  what  assurance,  what 
turbulence !  One  of  them  especially,  the  loudest 
bawler,  the  most  gesticulating  of  the  band,  remains, 
more  particularly,  in  my  memory.  I  can  see  him 
now  as  he  entered  the  room,  round-backed,  rolling 
his  shoulders,  blind  of  one  eye,  and  his  face  all 
inflamed. 

As  soon  as  he  entered,  the  other  horse-heads 
sprang  up  around  the  table  and  greeted  him  with 
a  formidable  neigh:  — 


2OO          Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

11  Ha !  ha !  ha !  here 's  Gambetta !  " 

They  pronounced  it,  the  monsters  !  Ghambetthah, 
and  a  mouthful  it  was  ! 

He,  sitting  noisily  down,  spread  himself  over  the 
table,  or  threw  himself  back  in  his  chair,  perorated, 
rapped  with  his  fist,  laughed  till  the  windows  shook, 
dragged  the  table-cloth  about  him,  spat  to  a  dis- 
tance, got  drunk  without  drinking,  snatched  the 
dishes  from  your  hands,  the  words  from  your 
mouth,  and,  after  having  talked  the  whole  time, 
went  away  without  having  said  a  single  thing ; 
Gaudissart  and  Gazonal  in  one ;  that  is  to  say,  all 
that  can  be  imagined  most  provincial,  most  sono- 
rous, and  most  tiresome.  I  remember  that  once  I 
invited  to  our  table  a  little  employe"  of  the  city,  a 
cold  lad,  very  self-contained,  who  had  just  made 
his  de"but  in  the  Charivari,  signing  the  name  of 
Henri  Rochefort  to  theatre  articles  in  a  prose 
as  sober  and  reserved  as  his  own  person.  Gam- 
betta, to  do  honour  to  the  journalist,  seated  him 
on  his  right,  the  side  of  his  sound  eye,  and 
soaked  him  all  the  evening  with  his  eloquence,  so 
well  and  so  long  that  the  future  chairman  of  the 
Committee  on  Barricades,  carried  away  from  my 
dinner  a  stupendous  headache  which  cut  short  our 
relations.  Since  then  I  have  greatly  regretted  him. 

You  see,  my  dear  absent  friend,  how  mistaken 
we  can  be  about  men.  How  many  times  did  we 
say  that  that  flower  of  the  Tarn-et-Garonne  would 
return  to  his  own  region  and  flatten  himself  day 
by  day  between  the  heavy  folios  of  a  provincial 
code  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Auch  or  Pe"zenas, 


The  Dictators.  201 

We  never  once  suspected  then  that  we  had  before 
us  a  great  orator  in  the  germ,  a  deputy,  a  minister, 
a  dictator;  and  that  from  that  disorderly  brain, 
that  flux  of  language,  thick  and  muddy  as  the 
waters  of  a  pool,  would  one  day  gush  a  word  of 
power  which  seemed  to  some  the  very  breath  itself 
of  the  Nation. 

How  came  it  so?  By  what  mysterious  opera- 
tion did  this  Tholomyes  of  the  table  d'hote  turn 
into  a  great  man  so  suddenly?  I  have  my  own 
idea  about  it;  but  it  is  a  poetical  idea,  and  you 
will  laugh  when  I  tell  it  to  you.  Nevertheless, 
nothing  can  be  more  real.  It  came  from  the  day 
when  he  acquired  a  glass  eye,  a  beautiful  blue  eye, 
with  an  inalterable  iris  —  from  that  day  dates  the 
metamorphosis  and  the  high  destiny  of  Gambetta. 
That  glass  eye  was  probably  a  fairy ;  and  in  bring- 
ing light  to  the  cyclops  face  she  gave  him,  by  the 
same  stroke  of  her  wand,  intellect,  power  of  ex- 
pression, the  gift  of  command,  and,  above  all,  the 
gift  of  malice.  For  he  is  malicious,  that  Gascon ! 
No  other  proof  is  needed  than  that  galloping  con- 
sumption about  which  he  made  us  all  so  pitiful 
last  year,  and  which  will  certainly  take  its  place  in 
history,  a  little  lower  than  the  crutches  of  Sixtus 
V.  in  the  storehouse  of  the  properties  and  artifices 
of  great  men. 

But  what  his  glass  eye  never  could  relieve  him 
of  were  his  terrible  Southern  accent  and  his  epilep- 
tic gesticulation.  In  those  respects  he  was  always 
the  former  Gambetta  of  the  rue  de  Tournon ;  and 
persons  who  knew  him  well  were  able,  without 


2O2  Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

leaving  Paris,  to  follow  him,  step  by  step,  in  his 
provincial  heroics.  We  could  see  him  thumping 
his  fist  on  the  balcony  of  prefectures  and  casting 
to  the  astounded  echoes  of  the  market-places  or 
the  great  squares  a  formidable  and  roaring:  "  Ci- 
toyems  !  "  Also  we  could  imagine  him  inspecting 
a  camp  of  Mobiles,  or  heading  a  patriotic  funeral, 
head  down,  back  rounded,  gait  rolling,  a  red  fou- 
lard knotted  crookedly  round  his  throat,  and  his 
right  arm  flung  carelessly  on  the  shoulder  of  one 
of  his  Mamelukes,  —  Spuller,  Pipe-en-Bois,  or 
Chose. 

Just  think !  if  one  had  the  heart  to  laugh,  what 
a  jolly  vaudeville  one  might  make  with  that  title : 
"  The  Mamelukes  of  Gambetta."  What  airs  and 
bedizenment  they  gave  themselves,  all  those  ninnies, 
those  obscurities,  those  incapables,  whom  that  glass 
eye  dragged  for  one  moment  out  of  their,  native 
dusk !  What  junketings !  what  fetes !  and  how 
hard  it  must  have  been  to  renounce  it  all.  It 
should,  in  justice,  be  said  that  the  business  of 
mameluke  had,  at  times,  a  cruel  side.  I  remember 
seeing,  some  four  or  five  months  ago,  the  head  of  the 
cabinet,  Spuller,  in  a  terrible  position.  It  was  on 
the  Place  Saint-Pierre  at  Montmartre,  one  windy 
afternoon  under  a  broiling  sun.  In  the  middle  of 
the  square,  Nadar,  wearing  his  aeronaut's  helmet, 
was  flaming  away.  In  a  corner,  the  enormous 
yellow  balloon,  lying  on  its  side,  was  slowly  inflat- 
ing. All  around,  stood  an  immense  crowd  come 
to  see  the  minister  of  the  Interior  mount  up  into 
the  sky  with  the  head  of  his  cabinet.  In  the  dis- 


The  Dictators.  203 

tance,    a    dull    but    incessant    cannonading    was 
heard. 

I  don't  know  why  it  was,  but  that  vast  blue  sky, 
the  yellow  balloon,  that  Delegate  of  the  Defence 
about  to  fly  upward  like  a  bird,  the  giant  city  with 
its  many  quarters  in  which  the  thunder  of  the 
siege  guns  was  lost  among  the  myriad  street  noises 
—  all  these  things  had  something  fantastic  and 
Chinese  about  them  which  made  me  think  vaguely 
of  the  siege  of  Pekin.  To  complete  the  illusion, 
the  worthy  M.  Spuller,  in  a  long  furred  coat,  opened 
wide  his  eyes  like  circumflex  accents  and  gazed 
with  horror  at  the  preparations  for  this  unusual 
departure  —  the  vast  sky,  Paris  below  it  in  a  fog, 
and  the  great  yellow  creature  swelling  up  to  sight 
and  dragging  at  its  ropes.  The  poor  mameluke 
was  piteous  to  behold.  He  was  pale,  his  teeth 
chattered.  Once  or  twice  I  heard  him  say,  quite 
low,  in  a  daft  voice :  — 

"  It  is,  truly,  a  most  extraordinary  thing." 
Most  extraordinary,  indeed,  Monsieur  Spuller. 


204          Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 


A  MUSHROOM   BED   OF  GREAT  MEN. 

ABOUT  the  year  LXVII.  of  the  republican  hegira, 
in  the  middle  of  the  month  floreal,  when  the  trees 
of  the  boulevard  Montmartre  were  beginning  to 
tint  with  green,  the  citizen  Carjat,  amiable  poet 
and  photographer,  and  behind  him  a  whole  covey 
of  young  lyricals,  thinking  that  the  absinthe  of  the 
Cafe  des  Varietes  tasted  of  straw,  crossed  the 
roadway  with  a  dignified  step  and  hung  up  their 
lyres  and  their  hats  on  the  hooks  of  the  opposite 
cafe.  It  was  thus,  that  the  great  future  destiny  of 
the  Cafe  de  Madrid  began. 

Up  to  that  time  it  was  only  a  large,  rather  mel- 
ancholy tavern,  with  faded  divans  and  clouded 
mirrors,  where  one  found  old  numbers  of  "  Iberia  " 
lying  about,  and  a  few  Spaniards,  gilt  and 
wrinkled  as  Cordova  leather,  drinking  choco- 
late bavaroise  silently.  The  noisy  invasion  of  the 
lyric  poets  dispersed  these  hidalgos,  but  the 
tavern-keeper  lost  nothing.  That  machine  for 
shaking  hands  called  Carjat,  once  installed  near 
the  cafe  window,  harpooned  the  passers  in  the 
streets,  and,  thanks  to  his  adroit  and  continual  fish- 
ing, the  Cafe  de  Madrid  became  in  a  very  short 
time  the  fashionable  literary  drinking-place ;  some- 
thing like  the  divan  Lepelletier,  but  more  mixed, 
more  lively — the  little  bourse  of  the  Beaux-Arts. 


A  Mushroom  Bed  of  Great  Men.     205 

A  newspaper  in  process  of  being  founded,  a  book 
about  to  appear,  the  opening  of  the  Salon,  an  ex- 
hibition at  Martinet's,  now  and  then  an  exchange 
of  slaps  between  two  lyricals,  a  little  duel  on  the 
lie  Saint-Ouen  with  effusion  of  sour  wine,  these 
were,  in  those  days,  the  great  events  of  the  place. 
As  for  politics,  they  were  little  thought  of.  And 
yet,  the  fine  flower  of  the  Commune  was  there, 
expanding  on  the  benches ;  but  who  the  devil 
would  have  thought  it?  All  those  young  fellows 
seemed  so  little  cut  out  for  dictators,  and  they 
were  still  so  far  from  thinking  of  it  themselves. 

Valles,  his  nose  in  his  absinthe,  joked,  sneered, 
spied  on  others  from  the  corner  of  his  eye,  and 
watched  the  cafe",  seeking  types  for  his  book  on 
"  Refractories."  He  had  talent,  that  Valles,  before 
the  Commune;  but  a  talent  without  suppleness, 
without  imagination ;  very  limited  as  to  dictionary ; 
the  words  "  flags,  rags,  bayonets,"  recurring  con- 
tinually and  merely  to  give  a  false  ring  to  his  sen- 
tences. But  with  it  all,  a  very  individual  way  of 
seeing  and  saying  things,  a  certain  joyous  ferocity, 
wit  that  was  wholly  his  own,  and  a  sufficiency  of 
literature.  In  those  lugubrious  tales  to  which  he 
devoted  himself  we  could  guess  the  bitter  laugh, 
the  eyes  suffused  with  bile,  of  a  man  whose  child- 
hood was  wretched,  and  who  hates  humanity  be- 
cause, when  he  was  young,  he  was  forced  to  wear 
ridiculous  garments  made  from  his  father's  old 
overcoats. 

Beside  Valles,  the  big  painter  Courbet,  con- 
ventional peasant,  puffy  with  pride  and  beer, 


2o6          Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

laughed  in  his  beard  and  shook  his  fat,  saying  evil 
of  Rophoel. 

Farther  on,  a  tall  thin  fellow  in  spectacles,  with 
the  curled  and  silly  head  of  a  lawyer's  clerk  and  a 
look  as  if  he  had  just  come  from  Fortunio's  office, 
was  going  about  from  table  to  table  distributing 
copies  of  his  first  book,  —  "  Desperanza"  by  Ver- 
morel,  a  work  with  a  philosophic  purpose,  written 
in  the  groves  of  Bullier  with  the  sentimentality  of 
the  Latin  quarter.  As  literary  promise  it  was 
scarcely  worth  more  than  the  novels  of  Paschal 
Grousset. 

The  latter  often  came  to  the  Cafe"  de  Madrid. 
A  pretty  little  gentleman,  gloved,  pomatumed,  and 
curled  with  tongs,  having,  both  for  speech  and 
writing,  that  deplorable  gift  which  is  called  facil- 
ity, and  with  it  a  craving  to  make  the  world  turn 
on  that  curious  given  name  of  his  —  Paschal. 
Poor  Villemessant,  who  was  always  open  to  the 
seductions  of  dress,  and  who,  in  his  last  years 
especially,  looked  less  to  the  talent  of  his  writers 
than  to  the  tying  of  their  cravats,  was  charmed  with 
this  perfumed  Corsican.  Novels,  items,  science  for 
a  sou,  Don  Pasquale  did  them  all  for  the  "  Figaro," 
and  as  many  as  he  pleased.  But  inasmuch  as  what 
he  specially  desired  to  do  was  to  make  a  noise, 
and  his  literature  made  none,  he  ended  by  getting 
tired  of  it  and  went  over,  as  they  said  at  Madrid, 
to  the  table  of  the  Politicals. 

He;e  's  what  that  famous  table  was.  It  happened 
that  one  day  the  machine  called  Carjat,  swinging 
his  great  arms  in  the  cafe  window,  caught  on  the 


A  Mushroom  Bed  of  Great  Men.     207 

fly  a  young  law-student,  named  Gambetta,  already 
celebrated  in  all  the  plum-shops  of  the  boulevard 
Saint-Michel  —  the  law-students  and  licentiates  go 
there  in  flocks  like  starlings.  Behind  Gambetta 
was  Laurier,  then  Mossieu  Floquet,  then  Spuller, 
then  Lannes,  then  Isambert,  all  of  them  great  poli- 
ticians, and  consumers  of  beer.  These  gentlemen, 
on  arriving,  took  possession  of  a  corner  of  the  cafe" 
and  never  left  it  until  the  revolution  of  Septem- 
ber 4.  It  was  there,  on  that  "  table  of  the  Politi- 
cals," a  noisy,  gesticulating  table,  that  Gambetta's 
fist  exercised  itself  for  five  years  in  parliamentary 
pugilism;  the  marble  is  still  there,  split  like  the 
rock  of  Roland. 

Later,  at  the  farther  end  of  the  cafe,  was  formed 
what  was  called  "  the  corner  of  the  Pure."  There, 
among  a  group  of  old  sachems  with  long  beards, 
solemn  and  dogmatic  ventriloquists,  snorted  Pere 
Delescluze,  nervous  and  high-strung  as  an  Arab 
steed.  With  his  cameo  profile,  his  feverish  ges- 
ture, his  fanatical  blue  eyes  —  eyes  so  young  be- 
neath those  white  eyebrows  —  he  reminded  me  of 
a  certain  commander  of  the  regulars  of  Abd-el- 
Kader,  whom  I  had  formerly  known  in  Algeria, 
whom  the  Arabs  venerated  as  a  saint  because  he 
had  made,  I  don't  know  how  many  times,  the 
journey  to  Mecca. 

Pere  Delescluze  had  never  been  to  Mecca,  but 
he  had  returned  from  Cayenne,  and  among  his 
own  party  that  counted  to  him  for  quite  as  much. 
He  was  the  Hadji  of  the  democracy.  There  were 
men  in  the  departments  who  had  travelled  two 


2o8  Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

hundred  leagues  merely  to  look  at  him  and  lay 
their  hand  upon  the  skirt  of  his  coat 

That  fact  gave  us  at  times  very  delectable  come- 
dies. One  day  I  saw  a  man  from  Narbon,  familiar 
and  hail-fellow-well-met  as  they  are  down  there, 
lead  up  to  the  table  of  the  saint  a  whole  delega- 
tion of  Narbonese.  Never  shall  I  forget  that 
presentation. 

The  man  from  Narbon,  proud  of  his  Delescluze, 
tapped  him  on  the  back,  leaned  upon  his  shoulder, 
hooked  him  by  the  buttonhole,  and  called  him 
from  one  end  of  the  caf£  to  the  other:  Delesse- 
cluzh!  winking  to  his  compatriots  as  if  to  say 
"  Hein !  you  see  how  I  speak  to  him."  During 
this  time  the  worthy  Narbonese  gazed  at  the  saint 
with  humid  eyes,  sighing,  raising  their  arms  to 
heaven,  and  giving  way  to  all  sorts  of  naive  and 
exaggerated  expansions,  like  the  savage  Friday 
when  he  found  his  old  father  at  the  bottom  of  the 
boat.  The  saint,  who  is  a  clever  man,  did  not 
know  where  to  poke  himself,  and  seemed  much 
displeased.  Near  him,  a  little  man  with  a  gray  tuft 
of  beard  under  his  chin,  the  head  of  a  kind  goat, 
and  light-coloured  humourous  eyes,  smiled  with  a 
touched  air  as  he  drank  his  absinthe.  This  was 
that  brave  Razoua,  a  former  spahi,  who  flung  him- 
self into  politics  to  please  Re"villon,  and  never 
doubted  that  some  day  he  should  be  deputy  of 
Paris  and  director  of  the  £cole  Militaire. 

Little  by  little,  however,  without  any  one  taking 
notice  of  it,  the  physiognomy  of  the  cafe"  was 


A  Mushroom  Bed  of  Great  Men.     209 

transformed.  Of  the  men  of  letters  of  the  first 
period,  some,  like  Banville,  Babou,  Monselet,  had 
fled,  frightened  away  by  the  stupid  racket ;  others 
were  dead,  such  as  Baudelaire,  Delvau,  and  Charles 
Bataille.  Some,  like  Castagnary  and  Carjat  him- 
self, had  gone  over  to  Gambetta.  Politics  had 
evidently  seized  upon  all  the  tables. 

But  worst  of  all  was  when  Rochefort  founded 
"  The  Marseillaise."  Then  a  cloud  rained  down 
upon  us  of  students,  old  and  pretentious,  im- 
provised journalists,  without  wit,  without  spelling, 
as  ignorant  of  Paris  as  Patagonians,  children  with 
beards,  who  thought  themselves  called  upon  to 
regenerate  the  world,  pedants  of  republicanism, 
all  wearing  waistcoats  a  la  Robespierre,  cravats  a 
la  Saint-Just,  —  the  Raoul  Rigaults,  the  Tridons, 
the  youth  of  Schools  who  had  no  youth  and  no 
scholarship,  did  not  love  to  laugh,  and  were  sulky 
and  savage;  celebrities  of  Belleville,  such  as  the 
famous  planner  of  the  club  of  things,  pawn-heads, 
greasy  collars,  greasy  hair;  and  all  the  cracked- 
brains,  the  trainers  of  snails,  the  saviours  of  the 
people,  all  the  discontented,  all  the  good-for-noth- 
ings, all  the  idlers,  the  incapables  - 

And  to  think  that  those  are  the  men  who  for 
a  year  past  have  guided  France!  To  think  that 
from  the  coarsest  to  the  silliest  there  was  not  one 
frequenter  of  the  Cafe  de  Madrid  who  has  not 
been  something  —  dictator,  minister,  deputy,  gen- 
eral, commissary  of  police,  inspector  of  camps, 
colonel  of  the  National  Guard !  And  how  luck 
has  favoured  them !  A  few,  it  is  true,  got  nothing 


210  Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

after  September  4;  but  March  1 8  repaired  that 
injustice.  That  time  nothing  was  allowed  to  go 
begging.  They  are  all  members  of  the  Commune 
now,  even  that  poor  devil  of  an  Andrieux,  a  chiro- 
manician  with  a  corroded  face,  who  used  to  wander 
timidly  behind  our  chairs,  begging  for  our  hands 
and  calling  us  "  dear  master." 

The  place  may  truly  be  termed  an  historical 
cafe.  If  the  revolution  triumphs  it  is  on  the  tables 
of  the  Caf6  de  Madrid  that  the  new  laws  will  be 
written. 


RocJiefort  and  RossignoL  211 


ROCHEFORT  AND   ROSSIGNOL. 

THE  Rochefort  whom  I  knew  on  my  arrival  in 
Paris  was  a  worthy  youth  of  rather  melancholy 
temperament,  living  modestly  with  his  father  on 
a  fourth  floor  of  the  rue  des  Deux-Boules,  and 
using  himself  very  hard  to  earn  the  bread  of  the 
household.  A  petty  employment  at  the  Hotel  de 
Ville,  a  few  articles  in  the  Charivari  paid  for  at 
six  farthings  a  line  (which,  to  tell  the  truth,  were 
not  worth  more),  from  time  to  time  a  "curtain- 
raiser  "  for  Plunkett  or  Cogniard  —  these  were  the 
makings  of  a  gray  and  tranquil  half-life,  which 
resembled  his  writings,  but  did  not  go  with  that 
very  eccentric  countenance,  those  thin  and  peevish 
lips,  that  great  worn  brow,  and  a  head  always  ach- 
ing, pale,  tortured,  nervous,  which  formed  at  that 
time  his  only  originality. 

What  I  liked  in  that  Rochefort  was  a  certain 
bravado  of  demeanour,  a  very  keen  taste  for  poesy, 
for  pictures,  and  especially  for  that  science  of 
Paris,  that  boulevard  experience  which  he  had 
even  then  in  the  highest  degree  as  the  son  of  a 
vaudevillist,  brought  up  at  Charlemagne  and  the 
Cafe"  du  Cirque.  With  that  exception,  there  was 
nothing  marked  about  him :  cleverness  without 
excess,  regularity  in  his  work,  the  manners  and 


212  Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

ways  of  a  clerk,  and  no  other  ambition  than  to 
see  his  name  often  on  the  posters  in  company 
with  that  of  Clairville  or  Siraudin.  Such  was  the 
Henri  Rochefort  of  1860.  The  other,  the  Roche- 
fort  of  the  Lanterne,  came  later,  and  it  is  to  Ros- 
signol  that  we  owe  him. 

This  Rossignol  was  a  clerk  of  the  city  whom 
one  met  everywhere,  —  at  first  representations,  at 
funerals ;  who  was  always  asking,  with  an  anxious 
air,  "Have  you  seen  Rochefort?"  and  who  spent 
his  life  in  following  him,  missing  him,  awaiting 
him,  fetching  him  his  cabs,  carrying  his  copy  to 
the  papers,  repeating  his  sayings,  imitating  his 
gestures ;  and  who  finally  ended  by  cutting  out  of 
Rochefort's  shadow  a  species  of  personality  of  his 
own.  The  type  is  rather  frequent  on  the  boulevard. 
All  men  who  become  a  little  known  drag  Ros- 
signols  after  them.  Such  individuals,  who  hold  an 
intermediate  place  between  servants  and  confidants, 
need  an  equable  temper,  the  instincts  of  a  hanger- 
on,  and  some  means ;  for  the  business  is  all-absorb- 
ing and  ill-rewarded,  and  sometimes  requires  out- 
lay. It  so  chanced  that  Rochefort's  Rossignol 
had,  over  and  above  these  necessary  qualifications 
for  his  part,  a  certain  originality  of  his  own. 

He  was  a  great  Panurge  with  long  flat  hair,  a 
singular  mixture  of  artlessness  and  cynicism,  of 
timidity  and  impudence,  stupidity  and  satire, 
youth  and  decrepitude  —  twenty-two  years  old  and 
the  whims  of  an  old  man,  a  cane  with  an  ivory 
handle  and  a  snuff-box.  The  most  silent  and 
gloomy  of  beings,  and  then,  suddenly;  an  excess 


Rochefort  and  Rossignol.  213 

of  wild  gayety,  cold  excitement,  outrageous  jests 
a  la  Bache ;  insulting  persons  in  the  streets  with- 
out motive,  simply  for  the  pleasure  of  gabbling; 
foaming,  saying  everything,  either  droll  or  inde- 
cent, that  came  into  his  head,  with  the  gestures  of 
an  epileptic,  the  eyes  of  a  Pierrot,  and  the  sad 
laugh,  the  prolonged  laugh,  of  emaciated  men. 

I  still  ask  myself  how  this  demoniac  ever  pene- 
trated into  the  peaceful  life  and  intimacy  of  Roche- 
fort.  Certain  it  is  that  they  were  never  apart. 
When  Rossignol  committed  follies  Rochefort  was 
there  to  repair  them ;  he  fetched  him  from  the 
guard-house,  took  him  back  to  his  parents,  stuffed 
him  with  theatre  tickets,  walked  about  with  him 
on  the  boulevard — which  made  my  Rossignol  very 
proud,  and  gave  him  early  a  taste  for  celebrity. 
One  fine  day  he  too  wanted  to  write,  or,  at  any 
rate  to  see  his  name  in  a  newspaper.  Rossignol, 
a  man  of  letters !  It  was  so  droll  that  Rochefort 
could  not  resist.  He  put  him  in  that  establish- 
ment of  lunatics  called  Le  Tintamarre,  and  know- 
ing him  incapable  of  writing  a  single  line  —  even 
there  —  he  amused  himself  by  writing  his  articles 
for  him. 

Then  occurred  a  singular  thing.  This  Roche- 
fort,  stiff  and  dull  when  he  wrote  for  himself, 
assumed  in  behalf  of  another  a  trivial,  crazy  liveli- 
ness which  resembled  Rossignol's  own  personality ; 
incarnating  himself  in  that  burlesque  type,  he 
acquired  all  its  eccentricities,  all  its  effrontery. 
The  maddest  things  that  came  into  his  head,  the 
things  one  dares  not  say,  the  scum  of  the  pen,  the 


214          Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

mud  of  the  ink,  seemed  to  him  good  enough  for 
Rossignol ;  and  as  he  mingled  with  them  his  own 
flair  of  Paris  and  his  clever  vaudevillist  knack  of 
managing  effects,  there  resulted  a  species  of  facetious 
literature,  coldly  frenzied,  illustrative  to  indecency, 
not  French  at  all,  but  very  Parisian,  dislocated  in 
style,  sentences  turning  summerset,  which  secured 
the  fortune  of  Le  Tintamarre  and  made  Rossignol 
famous  from  the  Caf6  de  Suede  to  Bobino.  On 
that  day  Rochefort  found  his  manner.  He  did  not 
deceive  himself  as  to  that ;  and  after  a  few  months 
of  such  exercise,  when  he  knew  his  trapeze  thor- 
oughly, he  said  to  the  other,  "  Go  alone !  "  and 
henceforth  he  did  Rossignol  on  his  own  account. 

The  unfortunate  satellite,  abandoned  to  himself, 
did  not  do  so  badly,  —  living  a  little  on  his  reputa- 
tion and  a  little  on  what  he  had  learned  from  his 
master.  Then  some  money  was  bequeathed  to 
him,  and  hey !  the  ladies  of  Bobino,  the  journalists, 
the  suppers,  the  gay  bohemian  life  !  In  short,  the 
poor  fellow  came  to  the  end  he  wished  for:  he 
killed  himself  by  sitting  up  o'  nights,  and  went 
away  to  die  in  the  gentle  land  of  Cannes,  in 
the  neighbourhood  of  Victor  Cousin  and  other 
celebrated  persons,  which  caused  him  a  certain 
satisfaction. 

Rochefort  had  various  reasons  for  not  throwing 
himself  into  the  same  way  of  life.  In  the  first 
place,  his  stomach,  —  one  of  those  terrible  gastral- 
gic  stomachs,  always  irritated,  ruined  at  birth,  by 
which  the  Michelets  of  the  future  will  not  fail  to 
explain  his  literary  temperament.  Besides,  where 


Rochefort  and  RossignoL  215 

would  he  have  found  the  time  to  dissipate?  He 
had  enough  to  do  to  keep  up  with  that  hurricane 
of  Parisian  vogue  which  fell  upon  him  like  a  thun- 
derbolt, uplifted  him,  shook  him,  scattered  his 
budding  fame  from  the  Jockey-Club  to  the  wilds 
of  America,  spreading  about  him  a  tremen- 
dous and  laughable  popularity  by  which  he 
was  himself  dumbfounded.  People  pointed  him 
out  to  one  another,  and  fought  for  him.  Race- 
horses bore  his  name.  Courtesans  pursued  him. 
"  Show  me  your  Rochefort,"  said  the  Due  de 
Morny  whenever  he  met  Villemessant.  For  it  is 
well  to  know  that  if  Rochefort  is  culpable  all  Paris 
has  been  his  accomplice.  We  spoilt  him.  We 
said  too  often :  "  How  droll  he  is,  that  Roche- 
fort  !  "  You,  yourself,  O  Veuillot !  you  laughed. 
And  how  determined  he  was,  that  fellow,  to  make 
us  laugh  !  How  afraid  that  his  fame  would  escape 
him !  Which  of  us  has  not  seen  him  biting  his 
nails,  the  day  after  one  of  his  articles,  asking  him- 
self anxiously:  "What  can  I  tell  them  next?" 
And  so,  when  he  felt  that  his  vein  was  exhausted, 
when  he  had  nothing  more  to  say,  he  did  as  Ros- 
signol  had  done ;  he  relied  on  audacity  and  said 
all,  all — in  the  Rossignol  language.  Hence  the 
success  of  the  Lanterne. 

Ah  !  my  friend,  God  keep  us  from  a  success  like 
that.  When  a  man  has  once  tasted  it  he  never 
ceases  to  drink  it,  no  matter  at  what  price,  and  no 
matter  in  what  glass.  In  hospitals  you  can  see 
unfortunate  men  cursed  with  alcoholic  madness, 
flinging  themselves  thus  on  anything  they  can  find  ; 


2i6          Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

vitriol,  eau  de  Cologne,  all  is  good  to  them,  pro- 
vided they  can  drink  it.  This  is  Rochefort's 
condition.  If  that  man  of  intelligence,  if  that 
gentleman  is  picked  up  of  a  morning  in  the  gut- 
ter of  the  Pere  Duchene,  believe  me,  it  is  not  polit- 
ical passion  that  drove  him  into  it.  Politics  !  did 
he  ever  even  know  what  they  are  ?  Nor  is  it  love 
of  gain ;  I  know  him  to  be  above  that.  No,  it  is  an 
inextinguishable  thirst  for  popularity,  the  alcohol- 
ism of  success,  with  all  its  symptoms,  —  taste  lost, 
stammering,  mind  wandering,  madness. 

At  one  moment  we  thought  him  saved.  During 
the  five  months  of  the  siege  he  had  the  courage  to 
let  himself  be  forgotten,  to  write  no  more;  and 
this  should  be  remembered  in  his  favour.  But 
after  that,  what  a  falling  back !  In  his  absence 
others  had  done  Rochefort,  and  done  it  better  than 
he.  In  vain  he  shouted  and  gesticulated,  his  popu- 
larity was  lost,  gone  to  the  Maroteaus  and  the  Ver- 
mesches.  .  .  This  is  how  I  explain  his  anger,  his 
delirium  during  the  last  days,  that  temporary  in- 
sanity, that  overflow  of  bile  which  drowned  every- 
thing and  blinded  him  as  if  his  gall-bladder  had 
burst. 

In  spite  of  all,  rid  him  of  his  bile  and  his  foam, 
and  Rochefort  will  always  remain  a  figure  of  this 
period.  He  came  at  his  right  time ;  he  found  the 
house  wide  open,  as  if  he  were  expected.  He  was 
the  providential  missile  —  if  providence  there  be 
about  it  —  sent  to  break  the  first  window  of  the 
Empire  and  give  the  signal  of  the  general  demoli- 
tion. .  .  Even  from  the  point  of  view  of  our  pro- 


Roc  he  fort  and  RossignoL  217 

fession,  we  ought  to  pay  attention  to  him.  His 
pamphlets  often  have  fire,  wit,  and  comic  power. 
He  gives  me  the  effect  of  an  exasperated  Paul- 
Louis  Courier,  exactly  on  the  level  of  his  epoch 
and  speaking  to  it  in  a  language  it  understands. 
The  two  pamphleteers  resemble  each  other  in  the 
part  they  have  played,  in  their  implacable  hatreds, 
and  in  the  artificiality  of  their  style  —  for  neither 
write  naturally.  But  there  is  this  difference  be- 
tween them,  the  same  difference  that  there  was  be- 
tween the  two  Courts,  the  one,  where  Horace  was 
translated,  the  other  where  Theresa  was  invoked. 
Courier  takes  the  affectation  of  his  language 
from  the  old  towers  of  the  sixteenth  century; 
Rochefort  has  picked  up  his  in  the  brand-new 
slang  of  the  nineteenth.  In  reading  Paul-Louis 
I  see  old  Amyot  laughing  at  me  between  the 
lines.  In  reading  Rochefort  I  think  all  the 
while  of  RossignoL 


218          Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 


THE  SENTRY-BOX 

"  THE  impression  made  upon  me  by  places  is 
one  of  my  troubles.  I  am  affected  by  them  be- 
yond all  reason." 

These  words  of  a  nervosity  wholly  contemporan- 
eous, which  one  might  think  were  written  yesterday, 
are  really  those  of  Mme.  de  Sevigne ;  and  never,  to 
my  thinking,  did  she  say  anything  more  deeply  felt 
or  more  profound. 

There  is,  in  truth,  in  the  places  where  we  live,  a 
mysterious  influence,  issuing  from  wood,  from  stone ; 
a  malignancy  in  surrounding  things  which  takes  de- 
light in  troubling  our  souls,  upsetting  our  ideas,  and 
impressing  our  miserable  brains  beyond  all  reason. 
I  don't  remember  now  which  little  town  in  Algeria 
it  was  where  the  soldiers  mounting  guard  at  a  cer- 
tain point  of  the  ramparts  felt  themselves  seized,  in 
less  than  an  hour,  with  an  insurmountable  disgust 
for  life.  Two  or  three  times  a  week  some  one  or 
other  of  these  poor  devils  was  found  hanging  to  a 
nail  of  the  sentry-box ;  and  the  proof  that  there 
was  something  more  in  this  than  the  mere  nostal- 
gia of  recruits  lay  in  the  fact  that  as  soon  as  the 
sentry-box  was  pulled  down  the  epidemic  of 
suicides  ceased. 


The  Sentry- Box.  219 

This  was  certainly  a  specimen  of  the  jettatura 
mentioned  by  Mme.  de  SeVigne";  but  I  know  a 
still  more  striking  instance.  Don't  you  remember 
fimile  Ollivier  arriving  from  Saint-Tropez  in  the 
month  of  April,  1870,  to  construct  that  marvellous 
public  building  of  a  composite  order  called  the 
Liberal  Empire?  He  too,  unfortunate  fellow,  had 
the  malady  of  the  sentry-box ;  and  it  was  to  evade 
its  pernicious  influence,  to  put  himself  as  much  as 
possible  under  shelter  from  the  bad  air  which  per- 
vades great  buildings  in  charge  of  the  State,  that  he 
was  firmly  resolved  not  to  take  up  his  abode  at 
the  ministry. 

"  I  shall  go  there  in  the  morning,"  he  said  to  his 
friends,  "  as  an  Englishman  goes  to  his  counting- 
room  in  the  city.  In  the  evening,  business  over,  I 
shall  shut  up  the  office,  and  come  back  to  the  rue 
Saint-Guillaume." 

And  then,  exciting  himself  with  the  idea  of  his 
coming  liberalism,  he  continued  enthusiastically : 

"  I  will  show  them  what  a  minister  of  Justice 
should  be.  No  style  in  his  household,  no  equi- 
pages. I  shall  go  to  the  Chamber  on  foot,  to  the 
Tuileries  on  foot,  and  never  then  except  to  the 
Council  of  ministers.  I  am  determined  not  to 
attend  either  the  grand  receptions  or  to  the  little 
suppers.  That  is  where  consciences  are  lost; 
and  I  intend  to  keep  mine.  .  .  Ah !  they  accuse 
me  of  having  sold  myself!  well  they  shall  see, 
they  shall  see." 

In  saying  this  the  worthy  man  was  sincere,  and 
the  execution  of  this  fine  programme  was  actually 


220          Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

begun.  For  some  time  the  ministry  of  Justice,  so 
stiff,  so  formal,  was  open  to  the  public  like  any 
other  vast  assemblage  of  offices.  Everything 
went  on  in  American  fashion.  The  minister  re- 
ceived you  without  letters  of  audience.  The 
antechambers  stood  empty,  the  ushers  crossed 
their  arms;  in  the  gloom  of  the  great  deserted 
salons  they  could  be  heard  wandering  about  with 
melancholy  steps  shaking  their  chains  like  captives. 
The  head  of  the  staff,  one  of  those  fat  fathers  with 
troublesome  digestions  who  are  always  afraid  of 
apoplexy,  received  the  head-clerks  in  the  courtyard, 
a  cigar  between  his  teeth,  and  wrote  his  signatures 
on  his  knees  at  the  edge  of  the  portico ;  which 
greatly  scandalized  the  office  servants  of  Monsieur 
Delangle,  all  of  them  as  grave  and  pompous  as 
magistrates. 

As  for  his  Excellency,  had  you  seen  him  arrive 
in  the  morning  through  the  arcades  of  the  rue  de 
Castiglione,  spectacles  on  his  nose,  cravat  awry, 
his  long  overcoat  of  the  last  provincial  cut,  and 
that  fine  new  portfolio  swelling  with  the  projects  of 
the  Liberal  Empire,  you  would  have  thought  him 
an  inspector  of  primary  schools  rather  than  the 
minister  of  Justice.  This  modest  behaviour  did 
him  great  harm  at  the  Tuileries,  where  his  crooked 
cravat  kept  the  ladies  of  honour  and  the  chamber- 
lains a-laughing;  but  that  did  not  trouble  him. 
Faithful  to  his  scheme  of  independence,  the  new 
minister  had  nothing  to  do  with  any  one  except 
the  emperor,  and  he  always  left  the  imperial  palace 
with  his  head  high  and  his  glance  proud,  having 


The  Sentry- Box.  221 

not  so  much  as  a  glass  of  eau  sucrte  on  his 
conscience. 

It  was  at  the  height  of  these  great  ministerial 
reforms  that  the  killing  of-  Victor  Noir  occurred. 
Poor  Victor  Noir !  by  merely  writing  his  name,  I 
see  him  crossing  the  boulevard  in  two  strides,  with 
his  tall  hat  of  rough  gray  nap,  his  pink  cheeks,  his 
athletic  shoulders,  that  exuberance  of  strength  and 
joy  which  he  knew  not  how  to  give  vent  to,  and 
that  good,  hearty  desire  to  please  that  shone  in  his 
boyish  eyes.  If  he  were  still  living  he  would  be 
only  twenty-three  years  old  !  .  . 

But  what  is  the  good  of  talking  of  these  things  ? 
The  case  has  been  judged  and  decided ;  the  death 
of  that  lad  is  nothing  to  us  now  but  a  date  in 
history —  an  unforgetable  date,  however.  On  that 
day  a  new  personage,  on  whom  the  makers  of 
plans  never  count,  that  tragical  shuffler  of  cards 
called  the  Unexpected,  entered  suddenly  upon  the 
stage  and  since  then  has  never  left  it. 

At  the  first  news  of  the  drama  at  Auteuil,  before 
the  lawyers  had  taken  possession  of  the  corpse 
and  paraded  it  everywhere  on  the  tumbril  of 
democratic  exhibition,  all  Paris  was  roused  to 
indignation,  —  fimile  Ollivier  more  than  any  one. 
The  night  of  the  crime  he  walked  up  and  down 
his  office  brandishing  the  letter  in  which  Prince 
Pierre  wrote  to  M.  Conti,  with  the  careless  ease  of 
a  noble  of  the  fifteenth  century :  "  I  believe  I  have 
killed  one  of  them." 

"  Ah  !  he  has  killed  one  of  them,  has  he?  "  cried 
the  luckless  minister  in  spectacles.  "  And  he 


222          Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

thinks  he  can  call  it  killing?  —  it  is  murder.  Bona- 
parte though  you  be,  you  shall  go  to  the  galleys, 
monseigneur." 

Meantime  as  it  grew  very  late  and  the  ministry 
was  still  full  of  people,—  M.  Grandperret,  prefect 
of  police,-  reporters,  messengers,  —  the  minister 
could  not  return  home  as  usual  to  the  rue  Saint- 
Guillaume,  and  towards  morning,  dropping  with 
fatigue,  he  went  to  the  bed  of  his  predecessor. 

The  next  day,  when  he  woke,  he  was  no  longer 
the  same  man.  The  indignation  of  the  evening 
before  had  given  place  to  conventional  sadness, 
uttered  in  administrative  language.  The  murder 
was  nothing  more  than  a  dreadful  misfortune,  a 
very  regrettable  affair ;  one  must  wait ;  one  must 
see.  The  influence  of  the  sentry-box  was  begin- 
ning to  be  felt.  On  the  following  day,  worse  still. 
Paris  was  not  yet  pacified  ;  it  was  judged  necessary 
to  remain  pro  tern,  at  the  ministry.  Little  by  little 
the  habit  was  taken,  so  that  after  the  miserable 
Noir  affair  was  smothered,  the  minister's  residence 
there  became  permanent.  Ushers  and  halberdiers 
resumed  their  pompous  pose  at  the  doors  of  the 
reception-rooms ;  the  bags  of  the  chandeliers  were 
removed,  and  the  founder  of  the  Liberal  Empire 
was  delivered  over,  without  being  himself  aware  of 
it,  to  the  malignancy  of  furniture  and  of  local 
officials. 

From  that  day  he  became  a  perfect  minister  of 
Justice ;  suppressed  newspapers,  sequestrated  indi- 
viduals, supped  at  the  Tuileries,  watched  his 
cravats,  did  all  that  he  did  not  mean  to  do,  and 


The  Sentry- Box.  223 

burned  all  that  he  had  formerly  adored.  His  voice 
changed ;  from  shrill  it  became  sour.  Contradic- 
tion was  intolerable  to  him.  Despotic  to  others,  he 
became  the  courtier  of  the  master,  and  when  the 
war  began,  seeking  for  nought  but  favour,  halluci- 
nated by  the  air  of  the  sentry-box,  he  could 
neither  will  anything,  nor  hinder  anything.  It 
was  thus  that  he  ruined  France,  and  all  of  us, 
and  himself,  and  his  dream  of  a  Liberal  Empire 
as  well. 

Oh  !  the  fatal  influence  of  official  sentry-boxes ; 
who  can  feel  himself  sufficiently  strong  to  resist  it? 
Moderate  liberals,  irreconcilables,  indtcousables,  the 
purest  of  the  pure,  in  less  than  one  year  they  all 
passed  that  way.  I  have  before  my  eyes  the  pom- 
pous posters  of  the  Central  Committee  on  the 
morrow  of  March  1 8,  also  that  species  of  pastoral 
letter,  well  floured  with  philanthropy,  in  which  they 
disavowed  with  such  indignation  the  murders  in 
the  rue  des  Rosiers.  What  protestations  and 
promises  did  they  not  make  to  us !  How  often 
they  said,  "You  will  see."  And  what  did  we 
see?  They  had  hardly  entered  the  H6tel  de  Ville, 
masters  of  the  mayors  and  the  ministers,  before 
those  givers  of  the  holy  water  of  political  clubs 
became  the  most  execrable  of  tyrants.  Does  this 
mean  that  all  those  fellows  were  rascals?  No! 
Besides  ferocious  gamins,  delirious  rhetoricians 
who  played  at  '93  and  put  their  reading  into  action, 
besides  adventurers,  cynics,  roysterers,  there  were 
men  who  believed  themselves  republicans,  illuminati 
of  socialism  whose  lives  had  hitherto  been  honest 


224          Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

and  honourable.  For  them  I  ask  some  clemency. 
Borne  suddenly  into  power,  and  overtaken  by  its 
vertigo,  all  the  more  because  they  were  so  little 
prepared  for  it,  they  are  scarcely  responsible  for 
their  acts.  The  atmosphere  of  the  sentry-boxes 
had  turned  them  into  madmen. 


The  Tricoteuse.  225 


THE  TRICOTEUSE. 

SOME  eighteen  or  twenty  years  ago  certain  very 
young  fellows  from  the  provinces,  arriving  in  Paris 
to  seek  their  fortunes  with  their  heads  full  of 
Balzac  and  their  teeth  of  a  fine  length,  were  very 
seriously  bent  on  reconstituting  the  Society  of  the 
Thirteen.  They  distributed  the  parts  among 
themselves,  and  assigned  to  each  his  battle 
ground  :  "  You  —  you  are  a  handsome  fellow ;  you 
shall  be  our  de  Marsay,  you  will  succeed  through 
women  and  salons.  You,  Blondet,  by  the  news- 
papers. You  Rastignac,  in  politics."  All  efforts, 
all  resources  were  to  be  held  in  common.  Those 
who  had  fine  linen  and  varnished  boots  were  to 
give  them  to  de  Marsay  to  enable  him  to  go  into 
society.  All  the  wit  they  each  possessed,  their 
invention  of  clever  sayings  and  ideas  were  to  be 
scrupulously  laid  aside  for  the  journalist.  Clients 
were  to  be  found  for  Doctor  Bianchon ;  the  politi- 
cal man  must  be  brought  forward  and  talked  about 
in  the  cafes,  —  all  this  being  wrapped  in  masonic 
mystery,  passwords,  private  signals,  and  the  rest 
of  the  pretty  nonsense  beneath  which  Balzac  con- 
cealed at  will  the  gravity  and  depth  of  his  marvel- 
lous studies. 

'5 


226          Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

Unfortunately,  such  things  may  be  dreamed  and 
written,  but  they  never  live.  Our  Thirteen  were 
not  long  in  finding  this  out.  At  the  end  of  about 
a  week  the  agreement  weakened ;  those  who  had 
fine  linen  preferred  to  wear  it;  the  journalist  had 
to  make  his  wit  for  himself;  the  political  man 
talked  alone  in  the  cafes,  while  his  brethren 
thought  only  of  emptying  their  mugs.  In  short, 
as  our  young  men  were  not  without  intelligence 
(and  the  air  of  Paris  gave  them  more  and  more 
daily),  they  ended  by  laughing  in  one  another's 
faces  and  going  off,  each  on  his  own  line,  to  make 
their  way.  I  don't  know  how  they  succeeded.  I 
only  remember  that  one  of  them  —  the  one  selected 
as  the  political  man  and  from  whom  I  received 
these  details  —  found,  after  a  while,  his  career  and 
his  adventures  suddenly  interrupted;  his  name 
was  Jules  Valle"s. 

Balzac,  Mme.  Sand,  and  all  the  great  novel- 
writers  of  the  modern  school  have  often  been  re- 
proached for  having  bemuddled  quantities  of  young 
brains  and  ruined  whole  lives  by  turning  them 
into  fiction.  But  is  that  the  fault  of  our  novelists? 
Is  it  not  more  just  to  lay  the  blame  on  that  need 
of  imitation  inherent  in  youth,  especially  French 
youth,  impressionable  and  vain  to  excess,  eter- 
nally tormented  by  the  desire  to  play  a  part,  to  put 
on  a  celebrated  skin,  to  be  some  one  —  as  if  the 
best  means  of  being  some  one  were  not  to  remain 
one's  self. 

And  as  for  this,  if  we  are  to  make  our  novelists 
responsible  for  all  these  aberrations  of  young 


The  Tricoteuse.  227 

brains  what  shall  be  said  of  our  historians  ?  They 
too,  they  have  caused  great  ravages,  especially 
of  late  years.  Ever  since  this  rage  for  historical 
studies  came  to  us  from  England  and  from  over 
the  Rhine,  ever  since  this  avalanche  of  histories  of 
the  Revolution,  of  memoirs  of  Robespierre,  Saint- 
Just,  I' Ami  du  peuple  the  old  Cordelier,  descended 
upon  us  have  we  not  seen  the  springing  up  of  a 
whole  generation  of  Young  France,  swathed  in 
huge  Jacobin  waistcoats,  carrying  their  heads  en 
Saint  Sacrament,  and  recalling  the  Convention 
by  the  multiplied  folds  of  their  muslin  cravats? 
They  do  not  now  say :  "  You  shall  be  de  Marsay ; 
I  will  be  Rastignac."  No,  these  say :  "  You  shall 
be  Saint-Just ;  I  will  be  Robespierre  " —  which  is 
quite  as  comical  and  much  more  dangerous.  I 
positively  heard  four  years  ago,  in  a  restaurant 
in  the  Latin  quarter,  young  Gascons  declaring  in 
their  devilish  accent :  "  Hein !  that  Raoul  Ri- 
gaut!  what  a  fine  Fouquier-Temville  he  would 
make !  "  He  did  not  fail  to  do  so,  the  wretch ! 
and  we  ought  to  do  him  the  justice  to  say  that 
he  thoroughly  filled  his  part.  Vermorel  played 
Robespierre  and  made  no  concealment  about  it, 
copying  the  man  with  the  pointed  nose  in  even  his 
private  life,  his  puritan  morals,  and  the  arrange- 
ment of  his  home  like  that  of  a  country  curate. 
They  all  had  their  '93  type  at  which  they  aimed. 
Sometimes  there  were  two  of  the  same ;  Robes- 
pierre-Vermorel  had  his  double  in  the  lawyer 
Floquet,  who  was  called,  among  his  intimates,  Max- 
imilien.  At  other  times  they  cumulated,  and  one 


228          Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

man  played  two  personages.  I  met  last  winter 
a  pretty  little  officer  of  chasseurs,  whom  Young 
France  had  taught  to  think  he  was  Hoche  and 
Marceau  in  one.  Not  Hoche  only,  nor  Mar- 
ceau  only.  No  !  Hoche  and  Marceau  !  And  he 
believed  it,  that  innocent !  You  could  not  have 
made  him  laugh.  Grave  and  proud,  teeth  clenched, 
gesture  feverish,  you  had  only  to  see  him  drink  his 
absinthe  to  feel  that  within  him  were  the  terrible 
preoccupations  of  a  man  who  hides  beneath  his 
overcoat  the  two  great  swords  of  the  future  repub- 
lic, and  is  always  in  fear  of  losing  one  of  them. 

These  things  amused  us  then.  None  of  us  im- 
agined that  the  comedy  would  end  so  tragically.1 
For  my  part,  I  regarded  it  all  as  a  play,  and  when 
I  could  slip  into  their  coulisses  I  delighted  in 
watching  the  actors  of  the  coming  revolution 
delving  at  their  parts,  rehearsing,  practising  stage 
business,  getting  themselves  up,  and  vamping  over 
the  old  decorations  for  this  renewal  of  '93,  which 
they  intended  to  give  some  day  or  other,  but 
which  I  myself  then  thought  impossible. 

It  was  in  this  way  that  I  chanced  to  be  present 
at  the  formation  of  a  corps  of  tricoteuses  [knitters], 
of  whom  I  just  escaped  being  one  of  the  organizers. 
The  circumstances  were  as  follows :  — 

It  was  during  the  siege,  at  the  hardest  moment 
of  that  hard  winter  of  black  cold  and  of  black 


1  Strange  to  say,  little  is  generally  known,  speaking  compara- 
tively, of  the  Commune  of  Paris,  the  horrors  of  which  equalled 
those  of  '93.  The  reader  is  referred  to  M.  Maxime  Ducamp's  his- 
tory of  it.  —  TR. 


TJte  Tricofeuse.  229 

9 

bread,  when  one  could  not  step  without  jostling 
some  baby's  coffin  carried  in  the  arms  and  hur- 
ried along  by  the  walls  of  houses.  "  It  is  heart- 
breaking, the  number  of  children  who  are  dying  at 
Montmartre,"  said  to  me  one  of  the  most  frantic  of 
the  Ninty-three-ers  of  the  Cafe"  de  Madrid.  "  The 
poor  little  things  go  barefooted  in  the  snow.  The 
cold  is  killing  them  like  sparrows.  It  would  be 
charity  to  give  them  stockings,  good,  warm,  wool- 
len stockings.  I  am  organizing  a  subscription  for 
it  —  how  much  will  you  give?" 

The  Ninety-three-er,  of  his  own  nature,  is  not 
sentimental.  In  the  steel-blue  regions  where  he 
soars  there  are  no  little  children ;  there  are  only 
ideas,  abstractions,  and  a  few  geometrical  figures, 
such  as  the  triangle  and  the  guillotine.  Conse- 
quently, I  was  rather  astonished.  My  man  per- 
ceived it,  and  in  order  to  convince  me,  he  added : 
"  Come  to-night  to  Montmartre.  I  am  to  speak  in 
behalf  of  the  object.  You  shall  subscribe  then  if 
you  feel  inclined." 

It  was  worth  the  trouble,  and  I  made  the  journey 
to  Montmartre. 

The  affair  took  place  in  a  ballroom  on  the  ex- 
terior boulevard ;  some  Boule-Noir,  or  filys6e,  or 
other,  which  had  been  transformed  into  a  "  club." 
It  is  to  be  remarked  that  the  political  education 
of  the  people  of  Paris  takes  place,  as  a  rule,  in  the 
dance-halls. 

When  I  arrived  the  session  had  already  begun, 
the  hall  was  full,  —  an  immense  hall  of  great  length, 
well  arranged  for  squads  of  quadrilles  and  the 


230          Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

glorification  of  the  cavalier  seul  performance.  A 
few  petroleum  lamps  (Paris  being  now  without 
gas) ;  a  little  stove  around  which  laurestinus  in 
boxes  were  shivering  like  old  men ;  on  the  seats  an 
audience  of  workmen,  lesser  bourgeois,  National 
Guards,  Civic  Guards,  a  few  Mobiles,  a  tewjupillons 
in  velvet  caps,  five  or  six  cocottes  in  ragged  silk 
gowns;  some  had  come  for  the  club,  others  for 
the  stove,  and  the  cocottes  from  the  habit  of  going 
to  dance-halls  every  evening.  And  in  truth  there 
was  something  pervading  the  atmosphere  like  an 
echo  of  the  former  frou-frou;  bits  of  mazurkas, 
bars  of  waltzes  humming  about  the  ceiling  like  last 
year's  flies.  Above  it  all,  a  thick  mist,  smelling  of 
pipes  and  moist  flesh. 

Perched  on  the  raised  platform  of  the  orchestra 
was  my  Ninety-three-er,  speaking  with  melancholy 
emotion  of  the  great  misery  of  the  people  and  the 
terrible  mortality  among  little  children.  Suddenly 
he  interrupted  himself,  retreated  one  step  back- 
ward on  the  platform,  arms  outstretched,  mouth 
open,  eyes  staring,  the  classic  amazement  of  ex- 
pressive heads. 

"What  do  I  behold,  citizens?"  he  cried. 
"  There,  there,  in  the  midst  of  you,  a  woman, 
that  woman,  who  knits  — 

He  stopped  for  a  moment  as  if  suffocated  by 
emotion,  and  stood  still,  arm  extended.  We  all 
turned  round  and  I  saw,  where  he  pointed,  an  old 
woman  with  a  canaille  head  and  that  crooked  lip 
and  twist  of  the  mouth  from  which  one  hears  in 
the  faubourg  the  tones  of  a  blackguard  of  any 


The   Tricoteuse.  231 

sex  before  he  speaks.  Under  her  cap  and  through 
her  grizzled  hair  was  a  knitting-needle  which 
stuck  out  like  a  dart  and  gave  her  the  look  of 
a  dangerous  beast.  Her  bony  hands,  which  she 
lifted  high,  held  the  half-knitted  stocking  of  a 
child. 

While  we  looked  at  her  the  orator  continued : 
"Who  is  this  brave  woman,  this  citizen  who 
comes  to  the  club  with  her  knitting,  to  listen  while 
she  works  to  patriotic  words?  Ah!  now  I  recog- 
nize her  !  She  is  a  knitter  of  Montmartre  —  one 
of  those  who  knit,  O  people !  that  your  children 
may  be  warm  like  the  children  of  the  rich ;  she 
knits  that  cold  —  in  the  person  of  Badinguet  — 
may  not  cut  the  throats  of  all  of  them  (laughter 
ajid  shouts  of  Good !  good  /) ;  that  a  few  be 
left  to  see  the  dawn  of  a  better  day  (Bravo ! 
bravo!).  O  saintly  knitters  of  Montmartre!  you 
are  worthy  of  your  elder  sisters;  like  them  you 
will  have  your  place  in  history.  Knit,  knit  there- 
fore, like  them,  for  the  People,  for  liberty !  knit, 
knit,  knit !  " 

There  was  no  need  to  tell  her  to  knit.  Under 
the  eyes  of  that  crowd  the  old  woman  knitted 
without  pause,  energetically,  and  I  caught  a  wink 
which  she  gave  to  her  confederate.  From  that 
wink  I  understood  the  whole  affair.  I  saw  that  the 
little  children  of  Montmartre  were  only  a  pretext, 
and  that  the  sole  object  was  to  raise  a  battalion  of 
tricoteuses,  to  float  once  more  a  musty  vocable  of 
the  dictionary  of  '93,  to  vamp  over  an  old  catch- 
word of  the  first  revolution. 


232  Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

Well,  well !  In  spite  of  all,  their  revolution  has 
turned  out  more  original  than  they  expected  to 
make  it.  They  wanted  the  tricoteuse  and  they  got 
the  petroleuse.  That  ought  to  teach  this  Young 
France  something. 


A   Year  of  Trouble.  233 


A  YEAR  OF  TROUBLE. 

NOTES  OF  A  PARISIAN  WOMAN. 

BY  MADAME  DAUDET. 

FACTS  do  not  strike  me,  only  the  atmosphere 
which  they  create  about  them,  the  time  of  day 
when  I  became  cognizant  of  them,  the  peculiar 
impression  of  which  they  ever  after  retain  for  me. 
That  is  what  I  shall  now  try  to  relate  to  you  —  I 
mean  that  singular  emotion  made  up  of  the  lessen- 
ing echoes  of  great  battles  and  the  distant  murmur 
of  dying  towns. 

In  the  May  of  last  year,  fleeing  from  Paris  already 
in  trouble  and  saddened  by  an  epidemic,  we  found 
at  the  little  house  in  Seine-et-Oise  the  flowering 
trees  and  the  usual  quiet.  Every  day  news  reached 
us,  accounts  of  riots  every  evening,  those  boulevard 
riots  in  which  the  railings  of  a  theatre  become  a 
refuge  and  the  newspaper  kiosks  attempts  at  bar- 
ricades. These  nightly  tumults,  which  one  drove 
to  see  in  carriages,  made  me  feel  the  triviality  of 
that  hurrying,  shouting  crowd,  singing  as  if  for  a 
festival  at  an  hour  when  the  boulevard  lamps  give 
to  the  leafage  of  the  trees  the  reflections  of  a  vil- 
lage ball.  The  word  "  Revolution,"  then  pro- 
nounced recalled  to  me  my  earliest  childhood,  a 


234          Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

flight  through  torn-up  suburbs,  and  courtyards 
laid  open  by  cannon-balls;  also  the  emotion  of 
those  about  me;  emotion  which  children  feel  in 
the  trembling  of  the  arms  that  carry  them,  and  the 
voice  that  speaks  to  them ;  and  lastly,  the  country, 
which  I  saw  again  in  sunshine,  all  blue  like  the 
mist  of  a  dream,  the  arrival,  the  rest,  all  danger 
passed.  This  was  like  a  lightning  flash  from  the 
bottom  of  my  memory ;  but  the  great  moral  shock, 
the  deaths  at  the  street  corners,  all  those  sinister 
things  that  my  childish  eyes  had  not  perceived,  I 
still  did  not  imagine. 

In  this  sad  month  of  May  Parisians  were  hurrying 
to  the  railway  stations  as  they  always  do  in  spring. 
For  many,  who  expected  to  return  in  the  autumn, 
exile  was  actually  beginning,  a  bathing-season  pro- 
longed to  a  year,  a  life  in  hotels  far  away  from  the 
home.  Mothers  were  departing,  little  aware  that 
they  would  never  again  see  the  beloved  home,  the 
family  nest  where  they  had  warmly  nurtured  their 
dispersed  children,  and  all  unthinking  that  they 
should  die  away  from  it  in  a  land  of  passage. 
Here  a  child  is  starting  for  a  holiday  who  will  be 
thought  of  later  with  regret  for  the  hasty  adieus  and 
the  long  revoirs.  Everywhere  separated  beings; 
and  later,  for  all,  a  poignant  uncertainty. 

The  small-pox,  which  had  driven  us  from  Paris, 
rapidly  invaded  our  tranquil  refuge.  The  few 
houses  between  the  forest  and  the  Seine  were 
made  uneasy  by  it  for  several  days.  Whole  fam- 
ilies were  attacked,  and  twice  I  met  the  same 


A    Year  of  Trouble.  235 

woman  in  mourning,  who  had  walked  a  league  in 
the  dust  and  heat  to  attend  the  death-bed  of  a 
relation.  I  was  working  one  afternoon  at  my 
window.  The  weather  was  fine ;  all  was  youth 
and  song,  the  trees  in  their  verdure,  the  flowers 
in  bud.  Some  one  said :  "  A  man  has  just  died 
close  by  you." 

I  had  seen  that  man  sometimes  as  he  came  along 
the  road  from  the  fields,  carrying  his  tools,  bent, 
weary,  humble,  and  obscure.  I  don't  know  what 
great  feeling  moved  me  all  of  a  sudden ;  without 
thinking  about  it,  it  seemed  to  me  that  death  went 
past  me,  quite  close,  beautiful  death ;  and  as  it 
passed  it  enlarged  the  sky,  the  horizon,  suspend- 
ing for  a  second  all  that  springtide  of  life,  respect- 
ful before  the  eternal  silence. 

Summer  came,  a  superb  summer  of  long  days, 
rich  and  flowery.  The  air  of  the  garden  grew 
tinted,  perfumed  with  blossoms  that  opened  to  the 
sun.  The  harvests  promised  to  be  magnificent. 
How  many  were  left  standing  that  year !  How 
many  ripened  and  were  never  gathered,  but  were 
lost,  scattered,  or  burned  in  barns  and  granaries 
open  to  the  winds  !  At  this  time  the  sunsets  seemed 
to  glow  like  conflagrations,  and  we  felt,  passing 
through  our  tranquil  hours  and  deserted  fields,  a 
stormy  breath  that  bent  the  wheat  and  made  the 
dust  of  the  high-roads  whirl  as  if  from  a  charge  of 
cavalry.  War  had  been  declared. 

The  Marseillaises  at  the  street  corners  ;  battalions 
crossing  Paris  and  beating  time  with  their  steps  "  to 


236  Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

Berlin,"  lines  of  ambulances,  collections  taken  up 
by  the  wayside  for  the  white  banners  with  the  red 
cross.  And  then  that  sad  departure  of  young  lads, 
Mobiles,  still  mere  school-boys,  whom  their  mothers 
brought  in  carriages,  with  how  many  tears  !  And 
that  formidable  throng  at  the  railway  stations,  that 
sad  concourse  as  if  the  whole  city  were  depopulat- 
ing itself,  in  which  one  -has  so  fully  the  sensation 
of  crowds ;  the  exhaustion,  the  bewildering  lassitude 
of  that  great  uproar.  What  a  hum  of  departing 
trains  !  .  .  Hasten  !  they  are  cutting  the  rails  over 
there,  they  are  burning  the  stations.  It  seems  as 
though  each  train  were  lost  in  the  darkness ;  as  if 
the  battalions  sown  along  the  great  plains  might 
seek  in  vain  to  come  together,  to  reunite.  All  is 
trouble  and  confusion.  From  time  to  time  a  word 
in  the  newspapers  which  chills  the  heart :  "  The 
enemy  are  pillaging  the  French  waggons  at  Reims." 
We  scent  defeat,  rout. 

Every  family  felt  the  counter-blow  of  our  disas- 
ter. I  remember  at  a  birthday  fete  how  the  flowers 
were  quickly  hidden  and  all  eyes  filled  with  tears ; 
anxiety  for  the  absent  one,  the  dread  of  fresh  de- 
partures ;  the  table  seemed  too  large,  the  house 
empty. 

Soon  we  were  forced  to  return  to  Paris.  Never 
in  my  life  shall  I  forget  that  August  day;  the 
peasant-women  weeping  at  their  doors  as  they 
watched  the  laden  carriages  and  flocks  of  animals 
passing  pell-mell  along  the  roads;  oxen  fastened 
upon  carts,  and  hand-barrows  on  the  highway. 
Near  to  Paris  the  trees  were  cut  down,  the  ram- 


A   Year  of  Trouble.  237 

parts  strengthened,  crowded  by  workmen;  and, 
in  spite  of  the  defeat,  as  it  was  Sunday  and  the 
sun  was  shining,  women  in  white  waists  and  light- 
coloured  skirts  who  had  come  to  look  on  at  the 
works. 

It  is  now  September  4.  A  morning  of  expecta- 
tion ;  something  in  the  air  like  the  vague  shadow, 
foretold,  which  precedes  a  great  eclipse.  Towards 
midday  the  bakers  close  their  shops,  the  streets 
empty.  Fighting,  they  said,  was  going  on  in  the 
Place  de  la  Concorde.  Paris  is  so  vast  that  one 
never  knows  exactly  what  is  happening.  .  .  But 
no !  from  the  boulevard  a  band  of  men  are  com- 
ing down  singing  at  the  top  of  their  voices.  The 
Republic  is  proclaimed.  I  feel  very  sad.  It 
seems,  however,  that  this  is  fortunate,  but  I  do  not 
like  these  songs  of  a  crowd  which  take  you  by  the 
throat,  force  emotion,  and  make  it  nervous.  I 
would  rather  hear  a  clear,  calm  voice  announce 
great  things. 

The  next  day,  a  visit  to  the  camp  at  Saint-Maur. 
What  flags  !  Paris  was  still  gay,  or  rather,  giddy. 
The  war  seemed  forgotten.  Perhaps  because  the 
Prussians  were  felt  to  be  steadily  advancing,  and  a 
trip  beyond  the  gates  —  gates  that  were  being 
armed  and  fortified  and  would  soon  be  closed  like 
those  of  a  prison  —  was  almost  a  boon.  Much 
noise  and  dust.  We  went  along  the  race-course, 
and  the  whole  way  resounded  with  the  noisy  gay- 
ety  of  Parisians  who  come  out  once  a  week  to  look 
at  trees. 


238          Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

The  lines  of  tents,  under  shelter  of  Vincennes, 
the  little  wars,  the  volleys  of  which  escaped  in  a 
white  smoke  at  the  foot  of  low  hills,  and  the  dips 
in  the  ground,  so  well  fitted  to  group  episodes  of 
battle,  this  going  and  coming  of  uniforms,  of  artil- 
lery, of  people  in  Sunday  clothes,  of  traders  of  all 
sorts,  this  morrow  of  revolution,  driving  with  great 
noise  in  over-crowded  char-a-bancs,  remain  fixed 
in  my  memory. 

A  few  days  later,  still  of  a  Sunday,  the  first  can- 
non sounded  under  a  clear  blue  sky.  The  very 
early  hour,  the  quiet  of  the  streets  and  neighbour- 
ing courtyards,  the  stillness  of  all  the  manufactories, 
of  the  thousand  noises  that  one  hears,  and  which 
fill  the  work-days,  conversations  at  doors — signs 
of  stoppage  or  of  fete  —  everything  about  me  made 
me  think  of  former  I5ths  of  August;  the  balconies 
decked  with  little  lanterns,  lines  of  gas-jets,  and 
flowered  with  flags,  the  long  avenue  of  the  Champs- 
filyse"es,  the  great  quays  of  the  Seine  bathed  in 
Bengal  lights  and  a  rain  of  gold.  .  .  This  time  the 
cannon  signified  other  things. 

Again  an  appearance  of  fete,  these  pilgrimages 
to  the  statue  of  the  city  of  Strasburg,  bouquets  in 
hand,  bands  at  their  head.  Later  that  stone  face 
was  veiled  in  crape.  And  yet  they  did  not  swathe 
in  black  the  statues  of  the  tombs ;  their  mourning 
garb  was  white,  strewn  with  immortelles. 

It  was  during  these  last  days  of  sunshine  that  I 
saw,  in  the  Palais-Royal,  seated  against  a  tree  on 
the  hard  gravel  of  the  public  garden,  two  poor 


A    Year  of  Trouble.  239 

women,  two  working-women,  employed  in  making 
caps.  Children  were  playing  around  them,  two 
handsome,  chubby  children,  rather  sun-burned. 
The  women  were  not  Parisians,  nor  peasants 
either.  Looking  at  them,  one  thought  of  the 
outskirts  of  Paris,  some  village  square,  doorways 
encumbered  with  linen  drying,  children  playing, 
women  working,  of  melancholy  streets  ending  in 
fields,  pavements  full  of  grass,  and  horizons  of  for- 
tifications. Poor  people  !  they  were  all  coming  in, 
dragging  their  household  goods  with  them,  to  lodge 
in  Paris  in  I  know  not  what  dark  hole ;  and,  im- 
pelled by  the  habits  of  open  air  and  outdoor  life, 
these  two  had  come  to  sit  at  the  foot  of  trees,  while 
the  Mobiles  were  being  drilled  before  the  shops  of 
the  jewellers  and  the  tables  of  the  cafe".  Exiles 
everywhere !  These  sad,  homeless  women,  those 
tall  fellows  in  blue  blouses,  all  under  their  guns  in 
the  bent,  patient  attitude  of  beings  accustomed  to 
delve,  to  toil  in  the  earth ;  listening  to  commands 
with  the  puckered  brow  of  narrow  intellects  which 
have  to  collect  themselves  wholly  before  they 
slowly  understand ;  after  which  they  remember 
well.  Such  were  the  exiles  from  the  provinces. 
Where  are  those  from  Paris?  Great  cases  full 
of  light-coloured  gowns,  morning  gowns,  toilets 
for  the  seashore,  for  Casinos,  canes  of  Louis  Seize, 
little  hats  with  enormous  feathers  —  all  had  been 
taken  away  for  a  trip  of  two  months.  October 
comes ;  the  rain  falls ;  the  sea  is  high ;  the  weather 
melancholy.  Let  us  move  on.  Accordingly  they 
change  their  abode,  thinking  all  the  while  of  Paris. 


240          Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

Artillery  caissons,  ambulances,  concerts  for  the 
wounded,  a  noisy  and  lugubrious  boulevard.  At 
night,  the  shops  lighted  by  a  single  lamp,  the 
houses,  the  trees  having  ample  space  to  spread 
their  shadows,  and  the  moonlight  superb  in  this 
extinguished  city  —  which  makes  the  corners  of 
the  streets  dangerous,  the  roofs  wan,  Paris  too 
large  —  it  is  thus  that  we  must  see  it  in  dreaming 
of  it. 

Each  house  has  its  anguish.  The  children  no 
longer  have  milk.  We  tremble  for  those  on  the 
ramparts.  We  fear  for  those  afar  off,  in  that 
gloomy  line  which  surrounds  the  city,  an  engage- 
ment of  the  outposts  and  those  watches  of  the 
grand'garde,  where  the  slightest  rustle  of  foliage, 
a  pebble  rolling  to  the  water  brings  the  hissing  of 
bullets.  Danger  everywhere,  and  day  by  day  less 
hope.  Oh !  those  dark  days,  the  pigeons  lost, 
the  provinces  so  far  off,  the  mud  of  Bourget,  the 
cannon  always  belated,  the  square  of  the  H6tel  de 
Ville  foggy  and  tumultuous. 

And  yet,  perhaps  never  did  one  feel  that  force, 
that  living  soul  of  Paris,  more  active,  —  in  spite  of 
the  very  cold  winter,  the  waitings  before  the 
butcher's-shops,  begun  in  the  night-time  and  in 
snow,  when  the  cannon  of  the  forts  were  thunder- 
ing, when  we  dreamed  of  French  battalions  ad- 
vancing in  haste  through  a  devastated  country, 
the  woods  rased,  and  having  but  one  battle  left 
to  fight,  one  river  left  to  cross ;  we  breathed  every- 
where an  air  of  high  courage,  as  if  in  Paris,  already 


A   Year  of  Trouble.  241 

delivered,  the  gates  opened,  Liberty  were  hover- 
ing above  the  whole  city,  laden  with  conquering 
banners. 

But  beyond  the  ramparts  what  distress !  De- 
serted roads,  abandoned  manufactories,  great 
gloomy  plains  already  looking  like  battle-fields, 
the  earth  torn-up  and  hollowed.  Loop-holes  in  the 
walls  of  the  manufactories,  intrenchments  in  the 
parks,  battalions  of  Mobiles  encamped  in  all 
the  villages,  some  installed  in  pretty  bourgeois 
residences  with  gilded  railings,  porticos,  balco- 
nies, where  uniforms  were  drying  the  day  after 
mounting  guard ;  others  were  shivering,  lighting 
great  fires  in  the  one-storey  houses  where  the 
smaller  tradesmen  of  Paris  go  out  in  summer  to 
spend  one  day  a  week,  and  where  from  the  garden 
and  the  low-windowed  chambers  they  can  talk  and 
call  to  one  another  in  the  peace  of  a  Sunday 
evening. 

All  around,  overlooking  this  melancholy  zone, 
woods,  mills,  hillsides,  scarcely  distinct  in  the  fogs 
of  winter,  where  the  enemy's  cannon  keep  arriving 
daily  in  spite  of  the  snow  and  the  bad  roads; 
planting  themselves  in  ambush,  pointing  at  Paris, 
rendering  forever  lugubrious  the  names  of  little 
villages,  so  gay  to  read  in  the  sunshine  on  the 
railway  stations,  at  the  corners  of  roads  when  they 
were  to  Parisians  the  objects  of  a  drive  and  a 
rendezvous  for  fetes. 

The  days  become  shorter,  bread  more  scarce. 
One  evening,  in  the  twilight  of  shops  lighted  by 
one  lamp  only,  there  are  gilt  things,  bright  ribbons, 

16 


242          Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

sugar-plums  in  tender  colours.  This  is  Christmas  ! 
The  humble  cradle  sheltered  in  corners  of  chapels, 
rocked  with  canticles  and  flowered  with  lilies  — 
adorable  symbols  of  infancy  —  gives  eternal  joy 
to  all  the  little  ones.  They  ought  to  see  in  dreams 
at  least  once  a  year  that  smiling  Jesus  lying  in  the 
manger,  the  straw  scattered  round  him,  like  lumi- 
nous rays. 

For  children  likewise,  this  New  Year's  Day  in 
a  beleaguered  city  spreading  playthings  out  among 
the  encumbering  masses  of  battalions  in  arms.  On 
little  tables  the  height  of  a  child's  eye,  we  see 
once  more  the  little  articles  of  furniture  (which 
look  like  a  pauper's  house-moving),  and  the 
chubby-faced  dolls,  to  which  snow  and  the  north 
wind  are  giving  such  lively  colours.  The  shops 
are  filling  with  marvels.  And  yet  those  heavy 
drays  we  are  wont  to  see  arriving  at  the  stations 
of  the  Eastern  railroad,  laden  with  white  wooden 
boxes  retaining,  as  it  were,  a  perfume  of  the 
forests  of  the  North,  are  not  coming  this  year; 
perhaps  they  will  never  come  again.  But  do  not 
feel  alarmed.  Paris  can  suffice  unto  herself,  and 
our  children  will  never  lack  playthings.  In  the 
depths  of  the  sad  little  courtyards  in  the  poorer 
quarters,  in  corners  of  the  faubourg  without  light 
or  air  there  are  tall  houses  five  storeys  high  filled 
with  patient  needles  and  delicate  looms  which 
scatter  threads  of  gold  lace  and  shavings  of  rose- 
wood into  the  dust  of  attics. 

Paris  still  found  strength  to  smile.  Two  days 
later,  on  three  sides  at  once,  the  bombardment 


A    Year  of  Troiible.  243 

broke  forth,  lugubrious,  continual.  The  earth  was 
shaken  as  well  as  the  air,  and  hearths  that  were 
sheltered  and  far  from  disaster  felt  their  windows 
shaken  like  a  warning  or  a  threat.  In  that  great 
city,  where  the  closed  manufactories  were  silent, 
their  strength  and  life  expending  themselves  on 
the  ramparts  and  at  the  outposts,  in  the  streets 
almost  deserted,  where  carriages  were  rare  and 
passers  sad,  this  great  bombardment  resembled 
those  storms  which  make  silence  around  them, 
arrest  the  rustle  of  leaves  and  the  murmur  of 
fields,  as  if  to  render  more  sinister  the  thunderbolt 
that  falls  and  the  house  that  crumbles. 

The  first  lightning  of  this  great  storm  had  shone 
upon  the  blue  line  of  the  frontiers  on  a  fine  sum- 
mer's day.  The  wheat  was  not  reaped,  the  vines 
lined  the  slopes,  the  great  trees  quivered  full  of 
life.  The  rivers  sang  beneath  the  arches  of  the 
bridges,  and  the  town  surrounded  by  fortresses, 
the  villages  surrounded  by  water,  composed  with 
their  daily  life  an  atmosphere  of  noise  or  of  calm- 
ness, which  rose  into  their  corner  of  the  sky,  and 
seemed  as  if  it  must  envelop  them  forever. 

"  The  enemy  is  crossing  the  Rhine  all  along  the 
front." 

I  remember  the  shudder  that  I  felt  on  reading 
that  little  despatch,  slender  as  the  line  that  marks 
the  frontier  on  a  map,  with  such  great  horizons  be- 
yond it.  After  that  day  nothing  could  stop  them, 
and  that  enormous  power,  invasion,  irresistible  as 
water,  which  flows  the  stronger  and  more  terrible 
from  each  obstacle,  drove  in  the  ramparts,  and 


244          Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

forced  the  passages.  Paris,  for  five  months,  was 
indeed  the  Isle  of  France  in  the  midst  of  a  torrent 
which  roared  around  its  gates. 

The  struggle  is  over.  As  the  forts  must  be 
surrendered,  and  the  arms  delivered  up,  the  sol- 
diers return  to  Paris.  They  march  without  order, 
disbanded.  We  feel  the  tumult  of  that  return, 
which  lets  us  see,  confused,  confounded,  dragging 
their  feet,  those  masses  of  men,  usually  so  alike  in 
gait  and  costume,  a  unit  in  marching,  that  we  seem 
to  hear  a  giant's  step  upon  the  way.  But  near  the 
Observatory  at  the  corner  of  one  of  those  streets 
lined  with  trees  which  end  Paris,  I  saw  a  whole 
battalion  of  Bretons  marching  in  line  as  they  did  on 
their  departure.  From  time  to  time  the  commander 
who  marched  at  their  head  turned  round  to  them : 
"  Come  on,  my  garsy  come  on  !  "  This  was  said 
with  the  intonation  of  a  shepherd  gathering  and 
encouraging  a  wearied  flock.  All  around  were  bat- 
tered houses,  twisted  balconies,  and  burned  sheds. 
That  day  was  heart-breaking.  Emotion  trembled 
in  all  voices.  Discouragement  was  in  the  air,  a 
lassitude  that  was  felt  even  more  than  defeat,  the 
despair  of  the  useless  weapon,  broken,  and  flung 
into  the  moats  of  the  fortress. 

Trouble  entered  Paris  at  that  moment  and  never 
left  it  again.  It  was  perpetual  agitation  —  the 
agitation  that  fills  the  streets  and  leaves  the  work- 
shops empty.  Processions  without  end  went  up 
to  the  Bastille,  grouped  themselves  around  the 
column  of  July,  which  was  decorated  with  red 


A    Year  of  Trouble.  245 

flags  and  crowns  of  immortelles.  Cannon  rumbled 
along  the  pavements  as  if  casting  a  defiance  to 
that  accursed  place.  One  felt  that  a  great  impetus 
had  been  given,  and  that  a  city  stirred  for  four 
months  by  so  many  songs,  trumpet-blasts,  and 
drums,  could  not  return  to  labour  and  to  calmness 
without  a  shock.  Paris  still  kept  up  its  appearance 
of  a  besieged  city  living  from  day  to  day.  The 
sidewalks  were  noisy,  encumbered  with  articles  of 
all  kinds  as  on  the  morrow  of  a  conflagration, 
when,  the  house  being  destroyed,  the  household 
goods  which  have  been  saved  cast  hurriedly  from 
the  windows,  the  women  and  children  camp  in  the 
streets  and  settle  there  for  the  life  of  a  day. 

I  do  not  know  what  uncertainty  keeps  us  at  the 
windows,  drags  us  to  noises.  Bayonets  glitter 
everywhere,  though  nothing  more  was  said  of  bat- 
tles, barricades  at  the  bridges,  defiances  of  Paris 
against  Paris,  those  dangerous  misunderstandings, 
when  tocsins  and  volleys  answer  each  other  with 
the  obstinacy  of  a  signal.  We  felt  the  pavements 
tremble,  hatreds  quiver.  With  it  all,  the  caprice  of 
a  Parisian  springtime,  the  most  capricious  of  all. 
The  March  sun,  that  hot  sun  which  comes  before 
the  buds  put  forth,  scorches  and  does  harm,  glid- 
ing between  two  showers  upon  crazy  posters. 
While  in  the  deserted  shops  the  long  idle  shop- 
keepers are  hastening  to  dress  their  windows,  clean 
the  panes,  and  sweep  away  the  dust,  sole  visitor 
from  without  for  months,  carriages  are  passing 
silently,  hurriedly,  bearing  away  the  life  of  Paris, 
the  fortunes  of  Paris. 


246          Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 
| 

Behold  her  delivered  over  to  herself,  shut  up 
anew,  that  terrible  Paris.  We,  who  have  all  left 
her,  we  live  with  our  eyes  turned  to  the  hills  that 
hide  her  from  us  and  knowing  nothing  now  of 
what  goes  on  within  her.  We  are  here  in  a  con- 
quered country ;  the  roads  are  free,  the  gates  wide 
open,  the  house  is  no  longer  its  own.  The  rail- 
ings have  gaps  for  the  passage  of  cavalry,  and 
around  the  lawns,  which  are  turning  green,  and 
the  groves,  that  are  budding,  soldiers  are  walking 
about,  crushing  the  flowers,  cutting  the  branches 
with  the  careless  indifference  of  idler  and  victor. 
Near-by  are  other  country-houses,  completely 
abandoned  for  the  last  year;  their  owners  de- 
parting when  the  war  broke  out,  and  never  return- 
ing to  see  the  miseries  of  the  invasion. 

The  house  is  plundered,  the  hedges  ruined,  grass 
is  growing  in  the  paths.  In  a  corner  of  the  garden 
is  a  woman  in  charge  of  a  child,  her  eyes  turned 
to  the  highway,  rendering  the  solitude  that  hangs 
about  her  sadder  still  by  her  own  air  of  expectant 
waiting  and  idleness.  The  bridges  had  all  been 
destroyed  and  the  great  trees  felled  where  their 
shadows  had  lain,  and  yet  by  the  shore  road  which 
swept  round  the  slope  the  Prussians  arrived  in  spite 
of  all  precautions,  without  the  loss  of  either  man  or 
horse. 

For  the  last  four  months  they  have  been  there. 
Battalions  succeed  each  other,  marching  toward 
Paris  or  returning  to  Germany,  and,  after  a  short 
halt  and  a  summons  on  the  high-road  (for  all 
doors  are  marked  in  advance),  the  men  enter,  in- 


A   Year  of  Trouble.  247 

stall  themselves,  clean  their  arms,  set  the  watches, 
and  go  in  and  out  at  all  hours. 

Nothing  is  usually  more  charming  than  to  be 
the  last  to  go  to  sleep  in  a  silent  house  which  we 
feel  to  be  full  of  loved  ones.  A  great  calm  after 
the  bustle  of  the  day  pervades  the  walls,  the  furni- 
ture; the  air  of  the  garden  and  all  the  breezes 
heard  in  the  tranquillity  of  the  night  seem  the 
breathing  of  the  house  itself,  slumbering  in  the 
moonlight,  the  doorway  mute,  the  windows  closed. 
But  to  feel  close  by  an  imposed  guest,  one  who 
has  come  of  himself,  gun  in  hand,  bloodying 
hedges  and  rivers,  a  guest  who  has  entered  by 
force,  to  whom  grief  and  pride  gave  free  way  as 
soon  as  he  arrived !  Who  knows  from  how  many 
battles  he  is  resting,  and  with  how  many  dreams 
of  victories  and  massacres  he  is  troubling  the  invis- 
ible soul  of  the  home?  There  is  a  corner  in  the 
house  that  one  would  fain  wall  up. 

It  was  in  the  midst  of  all  this  sadness  that  we 
heard  cannon  thundering  in  Paris.  In  the  wood 
still  leafless  the  shells  fell  like  hail ;  the  nightin- 
gales uttered  their  limpid  notes  in  the  white-thorn 
bushes,  the  frogs  hopped  about  in  the  little  pools 
which  the  rain  had  left  in  the  ruts ;  the  noise  was 
too  great  and  too  distant  to  disturb  those  little  lives 
that  were  only  made  uneasy  by  the  breaking  of  a 
branch,'  or  the  fall  of  a  leaf. 

The  Tuileries  and  the  Louvre  are  burned ! 
The  Tuileries,  a  beautiful  memory  of  childhood  ! 
Parisian  Sundays,  sombre  skies  above  the  gray  slate 


248  Letters  to  an  Absent  One. 

roofs,  the  basins  where  the  alleys  widen  and  branch, 
the  sad  clock,  the  statues,  the  great  terrace  skirt- 
ing the  quay,  the  water  so  near,  the  soft  melan- 
choly of  the  declining  day,  and  the  mist  which  rises 
while  Paris  is  illuminating  around  it.  Flocks  of 
children,  blue  velvets,  white  furs,  and  later  the  joy, 
so  great,  of  making  the  little  feet  run  in  the  sand 
where  we  have  set  our  own. 

And  the  Louvre  ?  Why  no  !  The  Louvre  was 
saved.  The  next  day  people  said :  "  Paris  is 
burned,  all  Paris." 

I  saw  it  later,  riddled  with  balls,  in  that  terrible 
hour  when  the  calcined  walls,  still  standing,  seemed 
to  be  protected  against  the  flames,  while  from  the 
smoking  ruins  rose  an  odour  of  conflagration. 

On  that  day  the  weather  was  superb.  At  the 
top  of  the  Hotel  de  Ville  the  sun  was  putting  gal- 
leries of  light  behind  the  vacant  windows,  and  the 
statues  stood  erect  and  whole,  as  if  their  proud 
deportment  had  saved  them  from  the  general 
overthrow. 


A  New  Library  Edition  in  English 

THE   NOVELS,  ROMANCES, 
AND      MEMOIRS      OF 

Alphonse  Daudet 

New  unabridged  renderings  by  competent  translators,  in- 
cluding KATHARINE  PRESCOTT  WORMELEY 
(translator  of  Balzac).  With  Introductions  by  Professor 
William  P.  Trent,  Professor  Brander  Matthews,  and  others. 
Illustrated  with  photogravure  frontispieces  from  portraits 
and  from  pictures,  by  Adrien  Moreau,  Paul  Avril,  G. 
Bourgain,  L.  Kowalsky,  L.  Rossi,  and  other  noted  French 
artists.  20  volumes.  lamo.  Decorated  cloth,  $30.00.  Half 
morocco,  gilt  top,  $60.00.  Separately  in  cloth,  $1.50  per 
volume. 

This  attractive  Library  Edition  includes  all  of  the 
Novels,  Romances,  and  Literary  Reminiscences  of 
Daudet,  thus  embracing  many  noted  masterpieces  of 
modern  literature. 

Memoirs  of  Alphonse  Daudet.  Alphonse  Daudet.  By 
LEON  DAUDET.  The  Daudet  Family,  My  Brother  and  I.  By 
ERNEST  DAUDET.  Translated  by  CHARLES  DE  KAY.  i  vol. 

Fromont  and  Risler,  and  Robert  Helmont.  Translated  by 
GEORGE  BURNHAM  IVES.  With  Introduction  by  Charles  de  Kay, 
i  vol. 

The  Nabob.  Translated  by  GEORGE  BURNHAM  IVES.  With 
Introduction  by  Brander  Matthews.  2  vols. 

Kings  in  Exile.  Translated  by  KATHARINE  PRESCOTT 
WORMELEY.  With  Introduction  by  Charles  de  Kay.  i  vol. 

'•jp  Numa  Roumestan.      Translated,  with  an  Introduction,  by 
CHARLES  DE  KAY.     i  vol. 

The  Little  Parish  Church.  Translated  by  GEORGE  BURN- 
HAM  IVES.  Introduction  by  Prof.  W.  P.  Trent.  I  vol. 

Little  What's-His-Name,  and  La  Belle-Nivernaise. 
Translated  by  JANE  MINOT  SEDGWICK.  With  Introduction  by 
Prof.  W.  P.  Trent,  i  vol. 


ALPHONSE    DAUDET   IN    ENGLISH.  —  Continued 

Tartarin  of  Tarascon,  and  Tartarin  on  the  Alps.  Trans- 
lated by  KATHARINE  PRESCOTT  WORMELEY.  With  Introduction 
by  Prof.  W.  P.  Trent,  i  vol. 

Port-Tarascon,  and  Studies  and  Landscapes.  Translated 
by  KATHARINE  PRESCOTT  WORMELEY.  With  Introduction  by 
Prof.  W.  P.  Trent,  i  vol. 

Thirty  Years  in  Paris,  etc.  Translated,  with  an  Introduc- 
tion, by  GEORGE  BURNHAM  IVES.  i  vol. 

The  Immortal,  and  The  Struggle  for  Life.  Translated, 
with  an  Introduction,  by  GEORGE  BURNHAM  IVES.  i  vol. 

Memories  of  a  Man  of  Letters,  and  Artists'  Wives. 
Translated,  with  an  Introduction,  by  GEORGE  BURNHAM  IVES. 
Notes  on  Life.  Translated  by  MARY  HENDEE.  i  vol. 

The  Evangelist.  Translated  by  OLIVE  EDWARDS  PAL- 
MER Rose  and  Ninette.  Translated  by  CHARLES  DE  KAY. 
With  Introduction  by  Prof.  W.  P.  Trent,  i  vol. 

Jack.  Translated,  with  an  Introduction,  by  MARIAN  Mc- 
INTYRE.  2  vols. 

Monday  Tales.  Translated,  with  an  Introduction,  by  MARIAN 
MclNTYRK.  i  vol. 

Letters  from  my  Mill,  Scenes  and  Fancies,  Letters  to 
an  Absent  One,  etc.  Translated  by  KATHARINE  PRESCOTT 
WORMELEY.  i  vol. 

Sappho,  and  Between  the  Flies  and  the  Footlights. 
Translated  by  GEORGE  BURNHAM  IVES.  With  an  Introduction 
by  James  L.  Ford,  i  vol. 

The  Head  of  the  Family.  Translated  by  GKORGE  BURN- 
HAM  IVES.  i  vol. 

No  living  French  writer  has  penetrated  so  far,  filled  so  many  hearts, 
brightened  so  many  homes,  cast  light  and  air  and  laughter  into  gloom, 
touched  the  source  of  tears,  and  made  us  all  feel  younger  and  fresher  for 
an  evening  spent  in  his  society.  —  The  Academy. 

Alphonse  Daudet  is  at  the  head  of  his  profession.  ..."  Numa  Rou- 
mestan"  is  a  masterpiece;  it  is  really  a  perfect  work;  it  has  no  flaw,  no 
weakness.  — HENRY  JAMES,  in  The  Century. 

Whatever  he~~c!oesf"  whatever  he  has  done,  .  .  .  has  been  a  work  of 
art.  —  GEORGE  SAINTSBURY. 


Little,   Brown,   and   Company,  Publishers 
254  Washington  Street,  Boston,  Mass. 


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